


Walking in the Dark

by Patchworkdk



Category: Star Wars Legends: The Old Republic
Genre: Dark, F/M, Keeper introduces himself by murdering a room full of kids, Power Imbalances, Team Agent isn't cool with having a pet SIS operative, They are spies, Violence, iffy consent issues, mentions of torture, seriously fubar relationship dynamics, spoilers for the Agent story and ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-03
Updated: 2016-12-16
Packaged: 2018-08-28 18:44:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 21
Words: 66,238
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8458792
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Patchworkdk/pseuds/Patchworkdk
Summary: The designations change, but the story's always the same: he's the handler, she's the asset. (Though not between the main pairing, there is a mention of past rape and one underage scene. Be warned.)





	1. Cipher Nine and Keeper

“I get it, believe me. First time I rotated back, I went straight home to my family. I sat outside for three hours, just watching. And I realized I could tell them everything I'd seen, everything that I'd done, and they wouldn't understand a single word. This isn't some speech. We're not walking in the dark. We are the dark.”

– Kara Stanton

* * *

 

 

Cipher Nine was half-way to Tatooine when she received a holo-call from a Darth Zash. The Jedi had somehow gotten wind of Zash's attempt to purchase ancient Jedi relics from a smuggler on Taris. They'd sent a padawan to intercept Zash's acolyte after the pickup and the relics had been lost.

“Zhorrid said you were such a dear about dealing with her little problem, I asked if I could borrow you for just a moment since you were so close to Taris anyway,” Zash finished, full of bubbly cheerfulness, as if Taris wasn't as far away from Cipher as Cipher was from Tatooine.

“Of course, my lord,” Cipher Nine replied because there was nothing else to do. “It will be done.”

“Delightful,” Zash said. “Just bring everything here to me on Dromund Kaas.”

“I don't know why you kiss up to them like that,” Kaliyo said after the holo faded.

“Have you ever been tortured with Sith lightning?” Cipher asked, hailing Keeper's holofrequency. Jadus's death had pulled Keeper and Imperial Intelligence straight into the heart of Sith infighting. If the station agent on Balmorra was to be believed, it wasn't going well.

Zash wasn't a Dark Councillor like Zhorrid, but that didn't make her any less dangerous. Zash was notorious even for a Sith. Not even Intelligence could figure out how she had been two places at once to kill Darth Skotia.

“It can't hurt more than a live wire.” Kaliyo waved her hand to emphasize her lack of concern.

“If I mess this up, it won't be me who finds out.”

“What's that supposed to mean?” Kaliyo demanded.

“For people who claim to be void of love and compassion,” Cipher explained, “the Sith certainly understand that watching those you are responsible for be hurt is a far worse torture than being tortured yourself.”

Kaliyo snorted.

“Maybe for someone like you. I don't have that problem.”

Cipher drew herself to a formal at-ease as the holo finally flared to life. Keeper's uniform was impeccable, but his face was dark with stubble. It had to be 03:30 on Dromund Kaas.

“Sir,” Cipher stated, “I apologize for the early hour. I regret to inform you my mission to Tatooine will be delayed. Darth Zash has requested me to see to an errand for her.”

Keeper raised his eyebrows slightly at Zash's name. From a spy as experienced as he, it was a mark of grave concern.

“I see. Thank you for the report, Cipher. Three friends among the Sith, now.”

“I am well aware that my friends are yours as well, sir,” Cipher replied carefully. Keeper's shoulders relaxed only a millimeter, but they relaxed nonetheless. “I am uncertain if I would call Darth Zash a friend.”

“There was resistance among the council to awarding Zash the title of darth upon her master's death, as there was resistance toward Zhorrid and her father's seat,” Keeper said mildly. “Because of this, they have each others' ear. Do exercise care, Cipher. Times are becoming dangerous.”

No mistakes, then. Understood.

“Yes, sir.”

Jedi were known for being skilled pilots. The most logical place to return the relics was Tython. Cipher mapped out the shortest route between Taris and the Jedi homeworld, regardless of space-born dangers. She jimmied her comm frequency and beacon to look Republic, set up shop in an asteroid field, and took a gamble on automated distress beacon. Three days in she hit pazzak.

Even with Kaliyo and a dozen concussion grenades, taking down the padawan and her droid was no joke. Still, desperation apparently counted for a lot because the togruta woman finally collapsed. Cipher let out a breath she didn't even realize she'd been holding when she found the padawan's pulse. The relics were in the woman's belt pouch.

“Not going to take the relics and let her go?” Kaliyo asked when Cipher slapped the stun cuffs on. “Usually that's your speed.”

Kaliyo's words stung because they weren't wrong. Cipher had spared Karrells, the Flame, Axis; gods, so many others because the alternative was unnecessary suffering or death.

“Not today,” Cipher said, wiping away the blood trickling down her brow. Not with the memories of Shadow Town so fresh in her mind. Zash couldn't just be satisfied with Intelligence's performance: she had to love it.

~*~

“My Lord, the relics,” Cipher said when she placed the bag on Zash's desk. “And a bonus.” She dropped the unconscious padawan on Zash's opulent floor.

Zash clapped her hands like a giddy debutante.

“Oh, Zhorrid did not exaggerate at all how wonderful you are. Name your reward, Cipher, anything at all.”

“Any agent would have done the same,” Cipher demurred as she had with Zhorrid. But having learned from her encounter with Zhorrid, she elaborated, “Intelligence is always willing to aid the Sith.”

“Any agent would have tried to recover my relics, yes,” Zash said cheerfully as two of her guards took the Jedi prisoner away. “But not achieved such unexpected results as bringing me the thief alive.”

“I wouldn't know what to ask for, my lord,” Cipher said with careful respect. She could feel Kaliyo's disapproval at her back. “Beyond knowing Intelligence has a friend.”

“I know exactly what you mean,” Zash said. She raised her hand and held it out, palm facing Cipher.

Cipher had been taught in the Academy to sheathe her will in powerful emotions Jedi found distasteful in order to resist a Jedi's mind-control. She'd used the technique successfully on the Phantom when the captured padawan had fought off the sedatives en route to Dromund Kaas.

Jedi mind-control felt like a tickle compared to the ramrods of ice Zash plunged into her mind. The rods tore her open like claws, revealing the wet innards to Zash's scrutiny.

If passion could protect her will against the Jedi, it stood to reason the white emotions Sith loathed would protect her mind against Zash. But she wasn't a Force-user. There was no way to protect herself completely. She had to let something go.

Force help her, Cipher chose to hide Intelligence's secrets inside mercy and compassion. Her own she left to be laid bare, trickling through Zash's fingers of ice like so many jewels.

~*~

 


	2. Useless and Cipher Nine

Her first designation was “Useless,” given to her by the older members of the gang of street kids her brother joined. She had earned the sobriquet by being born blind in a family too poor to ever hope to afford cybernetic eyes. After their parents died, her brother started using the name, too, to gain favor with the gang's leadership. By the time she was five she had forgotten whatever name her parents had given her.

The designation didn't change, even after her brother taught her how to hide under cafe tables and pick the pockets and purses of the rich patrons. She was smaller than all the other children, quieter, and with far more patience. She made a decent haul, even more than her brother some days. It was enough for the gang to keep them around. Without the gang, they would be picked up by Kaas City security for sure.

The only way getting caught by security ended was a slave collar.

The night before she would lose the designation “Useless,” her brother picked a new cafe to work closer to city center. The patrons would be richer, which would mean more credits per score. Her brother was trying to make the jump from thief to runner and he needed to impress the gang-leader. They came to the cafe at night so Useless could memorize the layout of the tables and choose the best places to hide. Between her brother's descriptions and the touch-landmarks she set in her mind, Useless was able to build a map in her head. When at last she made her way to every table in complete silence, her brother gave her her eighth birthing-day present two days early. Her birthing-day present was always chocolate. Useless ate it on the way back to the hideout.

They caught a little sleep at the hideout, then headed back out to the cafe to take their positions before the breakfast rush started.

“Caffa with chocolate, sir, as ordered,” the waiter had said to the patron at the next table over several hours into the morning.

“Thank you.”

“Will there be anything else?”

“No, thank you.”

Useless knew that chocolate could be made into a drink as well as a candy, but she'd never had any. The waiter hadn't seated anyone at her current table for ages, and the spicy-sweet scent of chocolate was even stronger as a drink than it is as a candy. Useless had opted to switch tables.

The patron's clothes didn't feel like any she'd stolen from before. The cut was similar to the suits businessmen wore, but the texture was all wrong. It was heavier, somehow, as if the cloth had been interwoven with something somewhere between metal and plastic. The belt was almost like those worn by security-men, but the pouches were different. Still, the chocolate smelled wonderful, and she'd known she was a clever pickpocket. Useless had concentrated on being extra-careful in case the patron was some kind of security. Soon she'd found his wallet. It was different as well, longer and thinner with a data crystal inside – and more credit chits than she'd ever found in one wallet before. There were three identicards in there as well. No one had three identicards, which meant two were probably fake. They were good fakes, because she couldn't feel any difference between them.

Fake identicards sold for a lot.

It was easily the biggest haul of her career. There was no way the gang's leadership wouldn't be impressed. Runners got better food and better beds. Her brother was always good about sharing rewards.

Useless had slid out from under the table with the greatest care and moved on. When the breakfast rush finally died down, she crept away from the cafe. When her brother returned to their meeting-place, she'd handed over her entire haul. Her brother was impressed by the strange wallet as well. He'd been so impressed that they had left the cafe right away to turn it in.

The gang's leadership had been pleased, particularly by the data crystal.

“Someone is going to pay a lot of money to get this back.”

Exhausted, Useless had opted to go to bed and let the leaders work it out. She had woken up to the sounds of screaming and fighting. At first she'd thought it was a rival gang making a raid and hidden under her bed. But as the fighting went on the sound of it began to change. Not only were people crying, but the sound of the fighting was dwindling slowly instead of all at once. It was also moving down the hallways and up the stairs.

Frozen with fear, Useless had stayed curled under her bed. She'd pressed her dirty jacket to her mouth to hide the sound of her tears. Maybe whoever it was wouldn't notice she was there.

“Please, you've got the wallet,” she heard one of the older gang members plead outside her door. “Just let me go.”

“I'm sorry. If you hadn't tried to read the data crystal, I would have. But now I have no choice.” Useless recognized the patron's clipped, precise diction from his conversation with the waiter. This was all her fault. She should have known to leave him alone. There was a wet crunch followed by the most terrible silence.

The rug tacked over the girls' room door rustled. She heard the patron's footsteps.

Useless held her breath, willing herself to be silent--

When her bed slid aside, she screamed. A hand closed around her throat, pinning her to the wall.

“You're blind.” The precise voice sounded surprised.

Useless nodded, her hands gripping the patron's wrist.

“Please! Please, don't kill me,” she whispered.

“How are you the gang's pickpocket?”

Her hands were shaking. This was her only chance. If she couldn't show him how she did it, she was going to die. He'd already killed everyone else.

Slowly, Useless let go of the patron's wrist with one hand. She ran her fingers up his arm as if she was searching for a pocket. There were wet places on his sleeve. Blood. Useless lowered her hand.

“How remarkable,” the patron said. “Even watching you do it, I couldn't feel it.”

“Do you-- Do you need something stolen?” Useless whispered, pleading. “I can, please.”

“As a matter of fact, I do. Are you only able to work that cafe?”

Only after she had explained about touch-landmarks and the maps in her head did the hand around her throat let go. Useless didn't try run. She'd be dead before she made it to the door. Cooperation was her only way out.

“What is your name, girl?”

“I don't know,” she replied. “They call me 'Useless.'”

“Charming,” that precise voice said dryly. “And insufficient. I shall call you Asset Thirteen. I can't have you tracking blood out of the building, Thirteen, so I will have to carry you out. Do you understand?”

Useless – Asset Thirteen, now, she reminded herself – nodded.

“Who are you?” she asked the patron.

“You may refer to me as Cipher Nine.”

~*~

Wherever Nine took her next was a long way by speeder. He made a holocall on the way. The lackey wasn't happy that Useless was a child, nor was he happy to be ordered to buy Useless clean clothes.

Nine took her someplace that smelled clean and unlived-in, with carpeted floors. She was told to take a bath in warm water that smelled of flowers instead of a cold unattended fountain. By the time she had finished scrubbing the street grime off her body and out of her hair, the lackey had returned.

“Sir, you do understand that I have to ask why you've taken a little girl,” the lackey asked. The place was very small, the door to the hallway was right by the bathroom door.

“She's not a little girl, Agent, she is a pickpocket.”

Cipher Nine knocked on the bathroom door.

“There is an outfit of clothes outside on the floor. After we walk away, retrieve them and put them on.”

Useless had never had new clothes before. All of the cloth was soft, and there were no holes anywhere. Petting her sleeve to feel the softness didn't seem like something Cipher Nine would like, so she did all her petting before she left the bathroom.

The lackey had brought food, too, or else Cipher Nine could cook. Useless didn't know what the meal was, but it smelled wonderful.

“Nine? Sir?” She asked outside the door. She heard only a few footsteps before she felt Nine grip her shoulder. She followed his lead.

“A blind pickpocket?” The lackey asked, dumbfounded. “You're a better liar than this, Nine. What's going on here?”

Nine held both her shoulders, pointing her in a specific direction.

“One foot ahead of you,” Nine stated. “Take whatever is in his breast pocket.”

The lackey was wearing the same strange clothes that Nine had been wearing. It made it easier to lift the long, thin vial.

“I stand corrected,” the lackey said, taking the vial back from Useless.

Nine guided her to a chair and told her to eat.

“So what is the plan?” the lackey asked as Useless felt along the table for her plate. The food was chunky, covered in a creamy sauce. The first bite seemed to explode with flavor on her tongue. It was savory and spicy in a way that made her mouth water. The texture wasn't quite bread but it was nothing like meat. Useless had gulped down two more bites before Nine interrupted.

“Use your fork, Thirteen.”

“What's that?”

The lackey laughed. Useless suddenly wanted to cry for reasons she couldn't articulate. She couldn't put her hand in her lap without getting her new clothes dirty. She settled for resting her fingers on her plate and biting her lip.

“A fork is used to pierce your food and bring it to your mouth instead of using your hands,” Nine said. Unlike the lackey, Nine's precise voice carried no amusement. He handed her a piece of cloth. She wiped her fingers clean with it. Nine handed her something metal. Useless explored it with her fingers. It had a long, thin handle and sharp bits at one end. A fork.

Nine adjusted her grip on the handle. His fingers had odd calluses on them.

Using her other hand to hold her plate, Useless lightly skimmed the tines along until she felt a chunk of food. She pressed a little harder, then lifted. The fork felt heavier. She carefully moved it to her mouth, then bit the food off the fork.

Eating with her hands was certainly faster, but keeping Nine happy was important so Useless kept quiet.

“It will become easier with practice,” Nine stated.

“The plan,” he said to the lackey, “is that while we cannot search the Moff directly without raising his ire and suffering retribution, Thirteen will be able to get us everything we need without him even noticing.”

“Steal his wallet every day until there are classified crystals in it?”

“It won't be in his wallet,” Useless said confidently. She felt the weight of her fork change as the food fell off the tip. “If it's really good stuff he'll keep it by his dick. Seccies don't like searching other men there. When rich kids want to pick up spice without the seccies noticing they always head up by Theron's place on 52nd. The security cams have been stuck on a two-day loop for years. If Moff heads there, that's when.”

“The Moff-- His-- his valet visits 52nd regularly. His daughter lives there,” the lackey said. His voice sounded strange. Higher. “Where did you get this kid?”

“She stole my wallet,” Nine stated.

~*~

Useless cried herself to sleep that night. If Nine noticed, he didn't say anything.

~*~

The valet always bought caf on his way to visit his daughter. Nine had a woman lackey, too, and she laid the charm on thick at the caffa stand while Useless worked. It made it easier because Useless didn't have to take the crystal, just find it.

As soon as the valet stepped away from the woman lackey, Useless nodded. The male lackey and Nine picked the valet up less than a block away. The woman lackey took her back to the un-lived-in place.

“So the Moff-person didn't have anything to do with it?” Useless asked. She wasn't certain what a Moff was, nor a valet, but if the valet had the crystal and was giving it to his daughter--

“Probably not,” the woman lackey said. “It would have ended Nine's career if he'd accused the Moff falsely. You did well.”

It struck Useless as a very odd thing for a lackey to say. But Nine was odd, too. He spoke like an enforcer, even though he was scarier than any boss Useless had ever heard of. He had control of more money than any enforcer Useless had ever heard of, either, to have the un-lived-in space plus wherever he actually lived, and to just be able to buy Useless new clothes like it was nothing. Her old gang had been the top rung of their neighborhood and he'd wiped it out all by himself. But neither of the lackeys seemed particularly terrified of Nine, so if all his gang's enforcers were that scary--

A strong gang meant protection. Plenty. Without her brother and with her old gang dead, the chances of Useless finding another gang at all were slim. Finding stronger than Nine's was impossible.

Hopefully Nine still had a use for her after this job.

“Doing well deserves a reward,” the lady lackey said. She patted the small table Useless had eaten at with Nine and the male lackey. “You wait here.” The lady lackey busied herself to the table's left.

Useless sat up straight when the female lackey sat something down. Sweeping her fingers over it revealed it was a bowl. There was a metal handle next to it, but instead of tines there was a scoop. The food inside the bowl was cold and goopy. Useless used the scoop like she'd used the fork. The food was cold and amazingly sweet.

When she finished the bowl, the lackey had Useless lay down on the couch. The lackey sang a soft song until Useless fell asleep.

When Useless awoke the room was ice-cold, as if the heating element had been turned off. Her stomach was cramping viciously. Useless rolled off the couch only to vomit on the floor. A shout of alarm raised no response. The lady lackey had left.

She'd lain with her head facing away from the door, which meant the bathroom was toward her feet. Useless didn't think she could stand, so she crawled. She had to pause twice more to puke. By the time she made it to the bathroom there were tears and snot running down her face. Useless pressed her forehead against the cool metal of the toilet. Her skin felt hot. She laid on the floor, shivering.

Useless drifted in and out of consciousness, waking only to heave dryly into the toilet. She drank once from the tap, but it only made the stomach cramps worse.

She didn't know how much time had passed until the door leading to the hallway opened.

“Emperor's name--”

Nine's voice wasn't precise this time. Angry (at the mess, Useless was sure) and confused, yes, and it was the sweetest sound Useless had ever heard.

“Help,” Useless choked out.

“What did you do?” Nine demanded.

“I don't know,” Useless whispered, but the woman lackey talked over her.

“She's a loose end, I thought you wanted her tied up. How is she still alive?”

She heard Nine reach over her, then the tap running.

“Idiot,” Nine said sharply. “Next time leave poisoning to Lethalities. Drugs work differently on children, everything from effect to dose per kilo.” Nine wiped Useless's face with a dampened cloth and took her pulse. His voice gentled long enough to say, “easy there,” then sharpened again. “What did you use? How was it administered?”

“Blue juice in her food and you are not serious.”

Nine wrapped Useless in something heavy and warm – his jacket – and picked her up onto his lap. The tap ran again, then off, then water dripped onto Useless's lips.

“Swallow,” she was told. It didn't sound like Nine had intended for his lackey to poison her, so Useless obeyed.

“Damn it, Nine,” the woman lackey said angrily. “I know you're a Medical, but you are not a doctor! You're an operative.”

“I am both,” Nine said. He dripped more water into Useless's mouth. The small amounts didn't cramp her stomach. “Violence is a useful and necessary tool at our disposal, Fixer, but it is not the only one.”

“You can't possibly let her go knowing what she knows.”

“I have no intention of letting her go.” Nine rested his hand on the back of Useless's head. He was warm, and she was so cold. Useless let her head rest on his shoulder. “Blindness is repairable and no one will ever suspect a child.” The anger bled out of Nine's voice. His next words were quieter, almost gentle. “If you survive tonight, you will be very useful to me, Asset Thirteen.”

 


	3. Asset Thirteen and Cipher Nine

Her cybernetic eyes were implanted at a military hospital: the staff referred to themselves by ranks instead of “doctor” or “nurse,” and their movements were crisply disciplined like Seccies in the city. Even so, she spent the first three months in virtual isolation learning to process and identify what she saw before they let Cipher Nine see her. He didn't look anything like she imagined: he was shorter and thinner than most of the men there. He was also the first person she'd seen with blue eyes. His hair was dark and straight, though, so she'd still been unique with her red curls.

He had examined the surgical sites crisply, alternating between asking questions of Thirteen to test her vision and questions in medical jargon to her doctor, Master Sergeant Par. Thirteen liked Par. He was kind, like her brother had been, and he called her “Adorable” instead of her number.

“Most satisfactory, Master Sergeant. You may go.”

“Listen, sir,” Par said, “she's still got three more months of physical therapy before she can be discharged. Her brain is still adapting to the new stimuli--”

“You made that clear, Master Sergeant. I am not removing Thirteen from the facility.”

“--pushing her too hard could cause permanent damage, life-long problems with pain--”

“You are dismissed.” Nine's cool voice took on the same sharpness he'd used when demanding how Thirteen could be the gang's pickpocket: if Par didn't stop talking, Nine was going to be scary. Par was nice, he was trying to be nice to Thirteen, he didn't deserve scary.

“I'm fine,” Thirteen told Par. Neither man was listening to her.

“I understand your operation is time-sensitive and we are at war, but surely waiting another month--”

“Really, Par, it's okay, just go--”

“I said: you are dismissed.”

“Sir, I can tell you're a doctor from your questions. She's obviously too scared of you to tell you if it starts to hurt--” Par pressed on.

“Par, just leave, please--”

“That is enough.” Nine didn't raise his voice, but the change in inflection silenced Par instantly.

Too late.

“You are correct,” Nine continued. He stepped away from Thirteen and crossed the room as he spoke. “I am a doctor, so I am sensitive to your concerns. But Thirteen is my asset, not your patient.” Nine knocked twice on the door. When it opened, he addressed whoever was on the other side.

“Master Sergeant Par is ready to leave. Tell Lieutenant Dorne to have Par transferred to Ward Eight. He should be more comfortable with serving there. I will require a different doctor to oversee Thirteen.”

There were things she saw with her cybernetic eyes Thirteen had come to understand normal eyes couldn't see. Par's pulse was racing and his blood-flow was concentrated in his extremities. He was furious.

_Don't mouth off, don't mouth off_ , Thirteen chanted silently. She didn't want to see what Nine would do if Par said one more word. _Just leave quietly, please._

Par left.

He wasn't her doctor anymore. She wouldn't see him again.

Her throat felt tight. Thirteen tried to take a breath, but all that happened was a hiccupy gasp. Another attempt ended in the same way. Fear trickled down her stomach. She couldn't breathe. Why couldn't she breathe?

Nine approached Thirteen and rested a hand on her back.

“A side effect of dual optic replacement. Your body is trying to cry, but it can't. You will hyperventilate and pass out if you don't calm down.”

“Pass-- out?” Thirteen gasped.

“Let out your breath as I count: one, two, three.”

“Can't-- Breathe--”

“Obviously you can breathe out because you are talking,” Nine stated. “Stretch each word out: one, two, three. In. One, two, three. Imagine a core of ice in your chest. It surrounds your heart. All of your sadness, grief, anything that could distract you is beneath the ice. It cannot touch you. It has no power. With each heartbeat the ice flows outward through your veins. You are the ice. Cold. Numb. You feel nothing.”

Thirteen could breathe deeply.

“You're the Iceman they talk about,” Thirteen said softly. It wasn't a question. Her brother was gone. Her gang was gone. Now Par was gone, and she couldn't even cry about it. Nine was all she had left and Nine was the reason she'd lost the rest.

Her throat burned again and her chest tightened.

Ice: cold and numb, Thirteen repeated to herself, or she wouldn't be able to breathe.

“I am,” Nine stated. “Now. I imagine your recuperation has involved long stretches of boredom. This will remedy it.” He picked up his bag from the floor. He pulled several objects from it. She recognized key cards, but not the rest. “For your next job you cannot just steal what I need. If the owners notice the items missing they will be made useless. You will need to make copies, quickly and quietly. You will also need to be able to defend yourself. Which would you like to start learning first?”

~*~

Her second three months of recovery weren't boring. Between Nine's lessons, the tutor he assigned to teach her to read and add, and physical therapy, Thirteen had every moment not taken by sleep filled. The new doctor, Sergeant Kel, wasn't as nice as Par either, so there was little in the way of fun in her therapy. The lessons in defending herself were the brightest spot of her days, especially the first time she successfully managed to knock Nine off his feet.

“Good girl,” he said, his voice deep and amused, looking up at her from the floor. Thirteen couldn't help but preen at the praise.

~*~

On the day of her discharge from the hospital, Nine told her what the job was: there was a brothel on Balmorra near the Republic Base that was frequented by officers. Attempts to plant an adult operative among the prostitutes' ranks had been thwarted by Republic SIS, but a child with no holonet records sold as a cleaning servant would be able to enter undetected.

“Am I your slave?” Thirteen asked. It would explain so much.

“I am whoever the Empire requires, and so are you,” Nine said. “I'm not selling you, I'm having Fixer Seventy-seven indenture you. Once I have what I need, I will have her repay the loan and retrieve you. It also gives the Hutt reason to treat you well. Should he kill you, he doesn't get his credits or his interest.”

“Will I have to wear a collar?”

“This one,” Nine said, pulling a slave collar out of a case. “I had it modified. It will not hurt nearly as badly as a standard collar, but it will still sting. Do try not to be disciplined.”

~*~

She made it one year when one of her targets shook the drug in his drink.

“What in the Force are you doing?”

Nine taught her what to do: a hand around the throat, and the heel of her hand straight to the nose. Unlike practicing with Nine, she used her full strength. The mark was a soldier, but he was also groggy and she was a nine year-old in dirty clothes with a slave's rough hands. A practiced physical assault hadn't even occurred to him as a possibility. The soldier dropped. His prostitute, still drugged, didn't stir.

Thirteen pressed hard to activate the beacon under her skin, again as she'd practiced, then waited. Nine and two others had used appointments with the girls as cover to pick up her copies. He was a regular, or his spacer cover was, and it wasn't hard for him to drug and ditch his prostitute to meet Thirteen.

Shamefaced, Thirteen explained what had happened.

“Inevitable,” Nine said calmly. “Many padawan candidates abandoned their training to join the military, or he simply could have a natural resistance. You have done excellent work this year, Thirteen. The war will be shorter with fewer Imperial dead because of it.”

Nine ruffled Thirteen's dirty curls. It felt nice. Then he clapped a hand over her mouth and shot the soldier and the prostitute in the head.

The numbness came on its own. She collected her equipment in a trance as Nine took the soldier's valuables. Whoever he planted them on would take the blame for the murders. No one would believe a prostitute or a slave who cried innocence.

“Destroy your equipment,” Nine commanded. “Fixer Seventy-seven will retrieve you in three days.”

She made it back to her hidey-hole beneath the stairs before the numbness wore off. She couldn't cry, but she couldn't keep herself from hyperventilating, either, until the darkness swallowed her whole.

 


	4. Asset Thirteen and Minder Four

“Admit it,” Thirteen said cheerfully, scrubbing up the blood out of the hotel's carpet. “You missed fieldwork.”

Six years had passed since her first cover op. She had added considerably to her repertoire of skills since, as the missions demanded. Crime scene cleanup had remained a consistent need until a year ago. Cipher Nine had been promoted to Minder Four. Thirteen's responsibilities had changed accordingly to picking up dead drops, making supply dead drops, and adherence to a strict academic regimen that would allow her to join the Imperial Intelligence Academy in four years when she turned eighteen.

“I think that you missed fieldwork,” Minder Four said. His eyes were crinkled slightly at the corners.

“That's not a 'no,'” Thirteen said, dropping her vibe-scrubber into the case. The carpet sparkled like new.

“No, it is not,” Minder Four agreed dryly, adding his own scrubber. “I will take these scrubbers to be destroyed. Change the identicards to our faces while I am gone.” The people they were replacing were the daughter of a newly-elected senator from Naboo and her bodyguard. Senator Gilnarrie was a populist, no part of socialite circles, which meant no one at Madam Fallon's School knew what his daughter looked like. To prevent such infiltration, the school required a medical exam upon arrival. Medical and DNA records could be altered, but nothing could make an adult pass as a pubescent youth to a skilled doctor.

Unfortunately for the Republic, Thirteen was not biologically an adult.

Offworld students boarded at the School, but children whose parents lived nearby had the option to reside at home. Thirteen was to make friends and be invited over, then collect what information she could. There were several generals with children at the School. If even one of them took classified information home-- If nothing else, she could case the homes' security for taking hostages later.

Thirteen wasn't certain if Minder Four had left desk duty to join her because he didn't trust anyone else with Thirteen's safety in the heart of enemy territory, or if he wasn't about to pass on to someone else the chance to infiltrate Coruscant. It could, she supposed, be both.

~*~

Unfortunately for the Empire, Thirteen had spent her childhood in Imperial service. She had had no more clue about socialite teenage politics than the girl she was impersonating would have, and Minder Four's preparation had proven woefully inadequate. When presented a dissection in Biological Sciences she'd followed her instructions to the letter with ease. Rather than drawing upon her as a resource when Thirteen had offered to clandestinely do the other girls' dissections for them, they had spurned her. She was now “Gruesome Gilnarrie.”

It was without doubt the worst designation she'd ever had. She'd never failed her partner yet, and here, presented with this perfect opportunity, she'd botched it utterly in a month and spare credits.

Thirteen rested her forehead on her fists where they rested on the bannister. She had retreated to the roof to think. There had to be a way to recover the situation. If not, she had to think up a way to tell Minder Four.

She heard the roof access door open. It was unlikely there was a threat here at the school, so Thirteen opted not to look up until her visitor stood beside her.

Her stomach dropped to her feet. It was General Amin Verzau. The Mirialan's daughter had been the one to create the “Gruesome Gilnarrie” designation, but more importantly, he was one of the top contributors to the Republic's war strategy.

“Bad day?” Verzau asked.

“Looking up now,” Thirteen's mouth replied while her brain was catching up.

Verzau chuckled. “Well, thank you for that. Care to talk about it?”

Given his daughter's presence at the school, telling a lie was virtually asking to get caught. Thirteen kept to the truth about Biological Sciences. Verzau hadn't told Thirteen his name and a normal student would have no reason to know him by sight, so she didn't hesitate to name names about the ringleader and her cronies.

“I'm sorry about Feylan,” Verzau said gently when Thirteen had finished her story. “I am away from home frequently for work and she doesn't always cope well.” At Thirteen's faked puzzlement, Verzau explained his relation to Feylan Verzau.

“Oh, Thirteen said. She looked down at the ground. “I'm sorry about what I said.”

“Don't worry about it,” Verzau said kindly. “As I said: she doesn't always cope well. Let me make it up to you. I know a most beautiful garden, with fountains and live Kalikiri fish as long as your arm. I could show you. A lovely young woman such as yourself shouldn't be sad alone on a rooftop.”

Thirteen didn't know how Minder Four faked blushes on cue, but she didn't have to: her face heated on its own. For some reason the suggestion made her spine prickle. Thirteen ignored it. She went to school with Verzau's daughter, she had no reason to fear.

Besides, there was a perfectly easy way to see to it Minder Four came along.

“I'm not permitted to leave the school grounds without my guardian. I can go get him--”

“Surely you don't think you need any more protection than me. This is Coruscant, not Nar Shaddaa.” Verzau chuckled. “The guards at the gate aren't a problem. The back entrance by the kitchens has a broken lock. Jiggle it a bit and you can walk right out. Feylan uses it to sneak out of school frequently.”

Not for the first time, Thirteen wondered what having parents would have been like. If she had been sneaking out against Minder Four's wishes and he had found out how, he would have eliminated the weakness in security, sat there waiting for her to use it, and then raked her over the coals for endangering the mission with stupid risks.

“Oh,” Thirteen said. She scrambled for another excuse, but it was too late.

“Lovely. I'll meet you across the street.”

Verzau left. Thirteen drummed her fingers on the railing. One excursion couldn't hurt. Her directive was to befriend the children, but surely Verzau could get her past his home's security just as well. He was a bloodied soldier, so she'd be able to relate to him better than his daughter anyway.

It was her best way to salvage the mission.

Thirteen left the roof. The staff gate locking mechanism was as weak as Verzau had suggested. Verzau's daughter wasn't with him. Feylan and her friends often talked about spending time at each others' estates. It wasn't unusual. Still, the prickle in her spine came again. Verzau had his own speeder, which carried them to a lavish hotel that would make any Sith proud to call it her palace.

Thirteen answered Verzau's questions with her cover's information just as she'd rehearsed. When Verzau told her some of his war stories, Thirteen recited Imperial victories in her head to fake the appropriate enthusiasm. She was lucky the Naboo accent sounded so similar to Dromund Kaas, it made it easier to fake for long periods of time.

The gardens were as beautiful as promised, so Thirteen gave in to the awe when she needed a break. Verzau put her hand in the crook of his elbow and walked closely. He knew quite a bit about Coruscanti history, which was interesting at least.

“Where are my manners,” Verzau said softly after they'd completed the circuit of the grounds. “You must be famished. Let me feed you before I take you back to the school. The Vinarine here is to die for.”

“I don't know what that is,” Thirteen admitted.

“It's a Mirialan dish, I'm not surprised you never had it on Naboo.”

The doorman knew Verzau and let him in without question. Verzau used a golden keycard on the elevator. It took them up for a while. The lift door opened to a short hallway and another door. Verzau used the golden keycard again, revealing a large, plush room with sweeping railings and a reflection pool. There was a small kitchenette and an office space.

An office space with a desk that held a rack of crystals. The crystals were marked with the sigil for Republic military classification.

Thirteen pointedly looked away from the desk. The mission's goal was less than five feet away. She had no sedatives on her. Verzau was tall for a human, much less a Mirialan. He was an experienced soldier with at least 75 kilos on her and he was completely sober. Subduing him was out of the question. There was nothing for it, Minder Four would have to break into the hotel later. Verzau wouldn't dare report the information missing without having to explain where the information had been. Her cover would be blown, yes, but that wouldn't matter. Minder would already have their exit strategy planned.

“Here,” Verzau said. He held out an expensive crystal glass. Thirteen knew the scent of wine from her time in the Balmorran brothel.

Another difference between a parent and a handler: Minder Four did not drink alcohol or take spice at all, nor did he permit his operatives to do so during an op. As a result, Thirteen was deft at pretending to drink.

The sun was setting outside the windows.

“Will dinner be here soon?” Thirteen asked, even though she hadn't seen him summon any room service. “My guardian will be looking for me."

“I took the liberty of telling the front desk you were spending the night with my daughter and her friends,” Verzau said smiling. “We won't be disturbed.”

Minder Four not only wouldn't be looking for her, he would deliberately not call to avoid derailing Thirteen's work or blowing her cover. The prickle of danger was too strong to be ignored even though it wasn't rational.

“You can't imagine how lonely it's been since my wife died. Finding a kindred spirit, no matter where-- is far too much to pass up. You're so much... more... than girls your age,” Verzau said. He brushed Thirteen's hair behind her jaw and gripped the back of her head. Then he pressed his mouth to Thirteen's.

Thirteen _froze._ Her mind went blank and she dropped the glass. Verzau didn't notice.

He broke the kiss long enough to hiss, “son of a schutta, knew you were hot,” before pressing his mouth to hers again. His other hand squeezed one of her breasts.

Thirteen berated herself for being so stupid. So blindingly, utterly stupid. She _knew_ how many men had paid the prostitutes on Balmorra to pretend to be school girls. She knew the Republic threw their high-and-mighty ideals out the window the moment they wanted something. How could she have trusted Verzau just because he was a parent? Lots of people were parents.

Thirteen gripped the material of Verzau's sleeve. She had two choices: try to fight back and risk Verzau's anger, or ride it out.

She could see the desk behind Verzau. The prostitutes and the girls at school had both commented on men's penchant for falling asleep afterward. With Verzau asleep, she could have Minder Four bring sedatives and copying equipment. She had the keycard. She was the guest of a guest. Four wouldn't even have to break in. They could have all that intel, undetected, tonight.

Agents did this all the time. Like killing, it was a duty Minder Four reserved for himself, so he hadn't taught her anything about how he went about it. But still, she'd taken basic anatomy and spent a year eavesdropping on prostitute gossip. She could do this.

It wasn't like she had to seduce Verzau. He seemed to be ready to go all on his own.

_I can do this. Ice and cold. I can do this._

Thirteen let go of the General's sleeves to grip his arms. She mimicked the movements of his mouth. Kissing was pleasant enough and so was his hand up her skirt. What followed after was decidedly painful – at least for her – but what she'd learned from the prostitutes was apparently enough that Verzau enjoyed it.

As Thirteen settled down to wait for Verzau to fall asleep, he said with his eyes closed, “Feel free to use the washroom to clean up. Then see yourself out. The doorman will summon my driver to return you to the school.”

Thirteen shook as she eased herself from the bed. She pressed her hands to her mouth to hide the sound of her gasps. She made it to the bathroom and quietly closed the door. Thirteen dropped to her knees and pressed her forehead against the steel. She made the long, tremulous breaths she'd learned in compromise between the instinct to cry and what her body could actually do.

_You have to get it together. He'll only be asleep for so long. If he wakes before Minder Four arrives the mission is a wash._

She'd spent a year living with prostitutes. In their work Minder Four and Thirteen both had often found them valuable sources of intel. Until that moment, she hadn't fully understood why people used “whore” as an insult. Now she knew: this used, disposable, ugly feeling was what they meant. Not the profession itself.

How did the girls, how did Sniper and Minder and Fixer, do this all the time?

_You are going to blow this if you don't get it together, Thirteen. Ice around your heart and this is beneath the ice._

When her breathing finally slowed, she pulled on her clothes. She called Minder Four with the volume turned almost to mute. She didn't wast time on pleasantries. Thirteen stated the address of the hotel.

“Bring a lullaby and the stuff from Balmorra,” she whispered, then ended the call. Her hands were still trembling when she pulled the keycard out of Verzau's discarded coat. She snuck out of the hotel room.

While she waited in the hotel lobby, the staff looked past her like she didn't exist. It was almost enough to set her gasping again.

Minder Four had the good sense to dress in his bodyguard's uniform. With Thirteen inside waving him in, golden keycard prominently in hand, the doorman let Four in without trouble.

When Minder Four saw her, his eyes took on their scariest look, even as his face wore a mask of worry for the benefit of the hotel staff.

“It was a necessary risk,” Thirteen whispered. Her voice was undulating oddly and she couldn't control it. She backed up towards the elevator and Four followed. “Everything we need is here and I couldn't let the opportunity pass. Please don't be angry.”

When the elevator doors closed, Thirteen inserted the key. Four leaned close and sniffed her hair, which was odd. Apparently what he smelled made sense to him because his next question was sharp and brooked no prevarication.

“Who did this to you?”

“General Verzau,” Thirteen tried to say, but her voice came out barely above a whisper. She tried to put more force in her voice. “He has a second office in his penthouse. I knew from the girls that men fall asleep, and I didn't have any sedatives, so I said yes, and he's asleep now so if we dose him we can take-- everything--” Her voice was completely out of control, pitching between fluting high notes and deep whispers. A high gasp escaped her control.

“Shhh,” Minder Four said. He pulled her forward gently by the shoulders. He wrapped one arm around her shoulders and petted her hair soothingly with the other.

It was the first time in her memory Minder had ever hugged her.

The fluting gasps came one after the other, unstoppable. The ice had been shattered, her heart was bare. She and Minder were of a height, now, and she dropped her forehead onto his shoulder.

“How do you do this?”

“I am trained. You are not,” Minder said softly. “It makes a galaxy's worth of difference. Easy, now. You did the necessary thing. You may wish you could take it back, have done anything else, but it was what you had to do for the mission to succeed. Without what we do, the Empire falls. Always remember that.”

When Thirteen's breathing steadied, she let go.

“I'm sorry, Minder. I shouldn't have lost it like that.”

Minder's eyes were sad, even if his face was as impassive as ever.

“I often forget that this wasn't a life of your choosing. You're not an agent, Thirteen. Tears, such as they are, are permitted.”

Thirteen nodded.

“Now,” Four said crisply. “The General.”

When Thirteen softly opened the door to the suite, they could hear Verzau snoring. They crept in quietly. Thirteen had no sooner placed the first crystal in the port when she heard four quick, brutal blows. When Minder emerged from the bedroom his face wasn't marked, but his knuckles were, which meant Verzau was bruised. So much for getting the intel undetected.

“What happened?” Thirteen demanded.

“The scope of the mission has changed,” Minder stated.

He could not be serious.

“We are not set up for a gag-and-bag.”

“Good command decisions can be compromised by bad emotional responses,” Minder replied, as if that made any sense at all. He grabbed ice from the small in-room cooler. “It is a risk intrinsic to working with a long-time partner.”

Minder risked a holocall to have Fixer slice the hotel's camera records. Thirteen stole a housekeeping cart. They hauled the General out like dirty laundry. Getting out of Coruscant involved a masked shootout with security and a wildly-overpaid Tarisian-descended smuggler with no love for the Republic, followed by another wildly-overpaid smuggler who drank while he flew, but they made it back to Imperial space in one piece with their prize.

 


	5. Asset Thirteen and Watcher One

At sixteen she was retired from Imperial service. Watcher One had a list of perfectly logical reasons: Thirteen was becoming an adult and would no longer be automatically discounted as she had been as a child; the war was nearly won so there was no urgent need for her particular services; that his new position was strictly analysis, thus there was no reason for him to have an asset on file.

“Ronto scrag,” Thirteen spat.

“There are no happy endings for an agent, Thirteen,” Watcher One admitted finally. His voice was heavy and his blue eyes were hollow. His hair had begun to thin. “I have taken as much from you as the Empire can reasonably demand.”

“If I didn't want this I would have run away,” Thirteen fired back. “We're a team.”

Watcher One's mouth thinned slightly. There was some reason he didn't believe she would run away, and he wasn't going to share it. Or perhaps he couldn't.

“You will have a modest stipend and a tutor to finish your academics. You will also have enough credits to choose a reasonable secondary education. If afterward you wish to apply to the Academy like any other recruit, I give you my word that should I find out I will not interfere.”

It was a completely reasonable compromise. She still hated it.

“You'll come see me, though? From time to time?” Her voice was undulating wildly. This was goodbye. She knew it. She didn't want to know it.

Watcher One briefly rested a hand on her shoulder.

“You know I can't.”

 


	6. Cipher Nine and Keeper

Thirteen had opted for medical school as her secondary education for two reasons: not only would the demand for Medical officers would make her a more attractive prospect for either Intelligence or the Military; but even if she didn't make the cut, she could still make a difference in ways other civilian professions couldn't.

Her scores on the entrance exam had made that worry moot. The Academy had been a mix of review and challenging new material. She had graduated top of her class. After an eight-year retirement, she was back.

Seeing her old partner introduce himself as Keeper on Hutta had been a wonderful surprise.

“So I take it you're my handler?” Thirteen had asked. But if she'd had any hopes of recapturing their old partnership, those hopes had faded.

Half the time he seemed like a stranger. He hadn't said a word to her outside of orders and intel, other than asking her why she'd joined Intelligence. His dry humor had disappeared. She couldn't imagine this Keeper losing his temper as he had on Coruscant or telling an asset that crying was permitted.

But still, there was a ghost of warmth and pride in his voice when he complimented her work that she didn't think she was imagining. He had made it clear her orders came from him, personally, just like a watcher; and he had given her his old designation after just two missions. That made her his protege, or at least made it look like she was to everyone in HQ. Surely he wouldn't have done so for such an inexperienced (on paper, at least) agent if he hadn't recognized her.

Marking her so publicly as his favorite also meant the senior officers would think two or three times before trying to enjoy the privileges of their rank, for fear of encroaching on Keeper's territory. Yet he hadn't made any advances himself. Making a show to provide protection was very much the man she'd known.

So was forgoing a privilege to which he was entitled simply because it clashed with his own moral code.

Cipher Nine used to be one of the few who could read Keeper, but now he confounded her. Worse, most of the time they spoke over holo, which didn't transmit the data on autonomic functions that her eyes could see in person. She was, in a very real sense, flying blind.

Not that it mattered in any way that mattered. Her training at the Academy had only made her a better weapon in his hand. His eye for strategy and talent were as keen as ever. He pointed, she struck, and together they were pulling off miracles.

It was also good, in a sense, that the connection between them had dissolved. The intervening years had been generous: his silver hair only made his blue-gray eyes seem more alluring, and time had softened his angular features into a patrician cast. His often emaciated-looking wiriness had also softened into a pleasing trimness.

He was handsome, now, and she was a trained observer. But since they were strangers, when she noticed the pleasing width of his hands or let creep into her fantasies the time a surprise monsoon had caught him between the speeder terminal and the door, soaking him to the skin – well, it was no one's business but her own.

Zash released her hold on Cipher's mind.

Nine crumpled onto the stone floor. The pain was worse than the worst headaches after her eyes had been implanted. Cipher knew she needed to get up off the floor. Her body wasn't interested in her demands. Her fingers kept twitching against her skull. Classic neural overload, common side effect of Sith mind-reading.

Zash grabbed Cipher by the chin.

“So that's what you meant by a friend among the Sith.” The Darth's voice was amused. “You're a loyal little kath hound, aren't you?”

“Yes, my lord,” Cipher said roughly.

“Zhorrid is not wrong, dear Cipher. With our precognitive powers and our mind-reading, it is simply not possible for a pack of terrorists to have killed Darth Jadus. Still, even in that most unlikely of events: keeping terrorists and rabble at bay is Intelligence's responsibility. But a little force-blind like your Keeper could hardly be expected to keep another Sith from Jadus's throat, now could he?”

The neural overload was making it impossible for Cipher to think clearly. She couldn't tell if Zash was telling her Zhorrid wasn't crazy and Cipher needed to look beyond the terrorists, or if Zash was telling Cipher to frame one of Zhorrid's rivals. Either way, it was good intel.

“Thank you, my lord,” Cipher replied. Zash stood.

“You can go,” Zash said to Kaliyo, shooing her away with one hand. To her two remaining guards she said, “take Cipher to one of the lesser guest accommodations. I will be along shortly.”

“I can't say I'm impressed with Sith generosity,” Kaliyo said with her arms crossed, pointedly not moving.

The purple lighting was immediate. The pain dropped Kaliyo to her knees next to Cipher.

“Instead of casting aspersions on Cipher's pretty manners, you should borrow them for yourself.” Zash's voice was still cheerful. It was actually worse than the usual Sith snarl. Kaliyo's body slid out the door with a wave of Zash's hand.

Cipher saw Kaliyo haul herself up as the agent was dragged away like the Jedi prisoner had been. Cipher was dumped unceremoniously onto a neatly-made bed in a room that looked more like a dormitory than a prison cell.

After several minutes Zash joined them. She leaned against the wall, reading a tablet. Nothing in her biosigns indicated anger. But if this was a prelude to Cipher's reward, she had no idea what that reward could be.

A few minutes later the door opened. It was Keeper. He had an elevated pulse and his blood was concentrated in the muscles: an acute stress response, even though his face was impassive. Cipher tried to stand at attention and managed a sort of roll.

“Go, go, make her well,” Zash said impatiently, waving Keeper on when he paused respectfully at the door.

“Tell me you brought zedrax,” Cipher croaked.

“Methylnine,” Keeper said, pushing up Cipher's sleeve. Methylnine was used primarily for electrocution. Whatever Zash had said to him, Keeper had expected Cipher had been tortured. Still, while it wasn't ideal, the methylnine would work.

“Neural overload,” Cipher informed Keeper. “She read my mind, sir.”

Keeper's eyes moved to glance up at Cipher sharply, but his posture didn't change.

The drug took effect almost immediately. Soon Cipher had enough control over her body to sit up.

“When I offered to reward Cipher for such lovely service,” Zash told Keeper, “she couldn't think of anything to ask me for, so I went on a little... expedition in her head. Imagine my surprise to find there was nothing I could award her that would mean nearly as much as a _personal_ expression of gratitude from you. That is within my power to grant, is it not, Keeper?”

“Yes, my lord,” Keeper said gravely.

“Lovely,” Zash said. “I will leave you to it. Let my guards know if there is anything you require from the mess. I will smooth things over next door.” The Darth left.

It was possible to be mortified and terrified at the same time.

Cipher dragged herself off the bed and began looking for listening devices. It meant she could delay looking Keeper in the face. The room was clean, which was a surprise. Of course, Zash had just stationed two cronies outside the door. Listening devices were somewhat superfluous. The “lesser” guestroom was exactly that: a bed, a computer terminal, and a small bathroom containing a toilet, sink, and fresher.

Cipher turned to face Keeper. She schooled her face into a suitably neutral expression and drew herself to attention. She waited.

“Well?” Keeper asked, gesturing to the room.

“In addition to Zash's task,” Cipher reported, “I retrieved her a padawan prisoner. I attempted to convince Darth Zash I only wished her favor for Intelligence, but she was unsatisfied. I kept from Darth Zash what I could, but it was not much, sir.”

“And since I am not currently being electrocuted for insubordination, I can assume what you kept from the Darth and what you did not,” Keeper sighed softly. “At ease.” He rubbed the back of his neck.

The silence drew on awkwardly.

If he didn't recognize her, then the fact Zash had found enough in Cipher's brain to justify this... well, creepy was really only the word for it. She hadn't known Keeper as Keeper long enough to justify that level of attachment. It stood to reason if he could look so different, so could she. There was no reason for him to remember the retirement alias he'd assigned her eight years ago.

“Do you – remember me, sir?” Cipher asked.

“Don't be ridiculous,” Keeper said sharply.

The rebuke stung.

“You retired me with no warning, went complete radio silence for eight years, and then haven't said so much as a word of recognition in the last two months. How was I supposed to know you hadn't forgotten?” The words came out angrier than she'd intended.

“Watch your tone, girl,” Keeper snapped.

“Girl,” as if she was a junior agent mouthing off. Which she was, now, even if she'd been his partner once.

“Sir,” Cipher said pointedly, looking straight ahead like a cadet in review.

The silence hung heavy again as Cipher reminded herself for the hundredth time that it didn't matter.

“That was unfair of me,” Keeper finally said, almost a whisper.

“As you say, sir.” A careful, textbook reply.

“When I was a young corpsman, my vessel was assigned to transport a Sith noble of considerable rank,” Keeper said evenly. “Corpsman” was the naval term for a Medical officer. No other branch of service used the designation. Even though his records had certainly been redacted, the information was still an astonishing gesture of trust. Cipher's anger disintegrated.

“She would have the Captain bring those who had been placed on report that day to the mess during dinner for her to use her lightning on,” Keeper continued. “She called it 'dancing.' Somehow I caught her eye. She summoned me to her quarters, and told me that I could dance for her or take off my uniform. Even had my Captain known, he could not have spared me. I assented to her desires. If I had had the benefit of Intelligence's sex training then-- But I did not. It was a deeply unpleasant experience that I did not fully recover from for many years.

“On Coruscant, Verzau knew no one in that hotel would come to your aid. He deliberately deceived me so I would not look for you. At time you could not have prevailed against Verzau in a direct confrontation, which he also knew,” Keeper continued. His voice had a strange quality to it Cipher had never heard. His pulse was irregular, and his extremities were vasoconstricted. “You assented out of duty, which he could not have known, instead of pure fear. Your assent was still given under duress. I knew why you were hurt so greatly and how long it would take you to repair the damage. When I saw him sleeping peacefully despite what he'd done-- I lost my temper. We were very nearly captured as a result. Watchers take to the field far more often than Minders. I could not take the risk that that might happen again.”

Good command decisions are sometimes compromised by bad emotional responses. Cipher didn't know what to say at first.

“You could have told me the truth.”

“If I had, you would have given up the Academy as an act of self-sacrifice,” Keeper stated evenly. He wasn't wrong. “I rather hoped that by forcing your departure on you, you would be so angry with me you would no longer _wish_ to join Intelligence. I see that I vastly underestimated your patriotism.”

Cipher stayed silent for a long while. The Iceman had a heart. Who knew?

Except she'd always known, deep down. For every time she'd been a pawn in his dejarik game, there had always been an element of kindness: clean clothes and a bath for a street rat; sight; a fake slave collar that wouldn't hurt; retirement at sixteen with the means to a future instead of a shot of poison. A thousand other little things delivered with a bland face and a nearly expressionless voice.

“So... now what?” Cipher asked gently. “We just keep pretending none of it ever happened and hope this doesn't blow up in our faces anyway? Because it is too late for me to transfer. Zhorrid is not going to take 'you are someone else's problem' for an answer.”

“No, she will not,” Keeper said heavily. “And to be perfectly honest, even if Darth Zhorrid was not part of the picture I cannot send you away. I have sent you on two suicide missions and you have achieved your primary and bonus objectives, and returned alive both times. Even if keeping you isn't the right thing, per se, it is the necessary thing. I will adapt.”

During her time at the Revanite encampment on Dromund Kaas, one of the Revanites had said that the Jedi believed time, like space, was curved -- that the infinite sooner or later bent back upon itself and ended up where it began. It seemed that so had they.

“I think you are being too hard on yourself,” Cipher offered. “As you say, you have ordered me to my death twice, as far as you knew.”

“And if they throw me into Shadow Town you will be able to leave me there?” Keeper challenged.

“No,” Cipher said because Keeper wouldn't believe it even if she lied. “But Watcher and Minder would insist on helping me, so I'm not certain that's relevant.”

It wasn't a smile so much as a deepening of the lines around his mouth. Keeper's pulse was calm and his vasodilation was back to normal. It was as close to “cheered up” as Keeper came. It was... distinctly pleasing.

Keeper cleared his throat.

“Excellent work out there,” he said formally. “Capturing a Jedi, even a padawan, is no mean feat.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“Well, that's sorted,” Keeper said briskly. He turned and headed for the door.

Cipher could say nothing and let him go. It would spare Keeper for the moment and save Cipher from having to explain what the Darth meant by “personal” and why. However, Zash could conclude Cipher had refused a gift that was, by every law and custom, hers to grant. The resulting offense would make capturing the padawan all for naught. Or Zash could conclude that Keeper had deliberately defied her.

“That's not the type of gratitude Zash meant, sir,” Cipher stated.

“I beg your pardon?”

“As I said, sir, I could only keep so much a secret. I did not understand at first that she was looking for what I wanted, not what I was protecting. By the time I realized-- it was too late.”

_Please don't make me say this aloud._ Keeper was not the only one who found half-truths easier than speaking plainly.

Keeper tilted his head. His gaze was calculating: the cool strategist. Having decided on a course of action, he stepped toward Cipher and removed his left glove. He raised his hand too slowly to intend to strike.

He drew the back of two fingers down Cipher's cheek.

The effect of that chaste touch on her autonomic functions was immediate. When Keeper pressed the tips of those same two fingers against her carotid artery, the effect also classified as telltale.

Keeper's heart-rate was racing as well. Cipher wished the only possible cause was desire, but that simply wasn't true. This wouldn't be the first time a Sith had ordered Keeper into a bed. Even though an agent was carefully trained to function in absence of desire and in the face of pain without incurring trauma, Keeper been forced as a Navy officer. Zash's order could just as easily be sparking remembered fear.

It wasn't right for Cipher to take advantage.

“You don't have to,” Cipher whispered. “If we make the right sounds the guards won't know the difference.”

The pressure against her pulse-point lessened to a gentle caress.

“I have spent the past few months reminding myself not to look at your breasts,” Keeper said dryly. “I give you my word, Zash's orders do not constitute a hardship.”

Oh.

_Oh_ , well then. That was--

Well that was wonderful was what it was.

Keeper tilted his head to give Cipher warning because making sudden moves at an agent was a good way to get hit. He pressed his mouth gently against hers. His lips were warm and chapped.

Her Sex and Seduction classes, all of her follow-through with marks had utterly failed to prepare her for what kissing would feel like when she meant it. It was a gentle, close-mouthed kiss and still she felt it all the way to her toes.

Keeper broke the kiss to brush noses gently. To her cybernetic gaze his body was alight with the early stages of arousal. Cipher lightly gripped the hand caressing her throat. She rubbed one gloved finger along the inside of his wrist. Intellectually she knew it wasn't possible to feel the heat of his body through the glove. Subjectively, she felt warmed all over.

Cipher gripped his gloved hand with her other hand. She pulled Keeper close for another kiss that was neither gentle nor close-mouthed.

Cipher had always found follow-through far more enjoyable with marks over forty: as men aged they required more foreplay to achieve erection and longer stimulation for ejaculation. Keeper was no exception to that rule. However, unlike Cipher's marks, he had significant manual dexterity and a vested interest in seeing to it Cipher enjoyed the experience as much as she did.

Sighing “oh, wow,” afterward and meaning it was a delightful new experience Cipher could definitely get used to.

There was only one pillow on the guest bed. With some maneuvering they found a comfortable position, with Cipher on her back and Keeper's head resting on her chest.

It felt like she hadn't really slept since Jadus's death. Drifting in a post-coital haze, sleep was frightfully tempting.

“Do you think we have time for a nap before we head back to HQ?” Cipher asked muzzily.

“Food and fresher as well.”

Keeper was ever the pragmatist.

 


	7. Cipher Nine and Keeper: Alderaan, Tatooine, and Jadus

Keeper woke several hours later. His back and hip felt stiff from his awkward sleeping position. He pulled away from Cipher and arched his back, attempting to stretch. His stomach swooped as he nearly fell off the narrow bed. Keeper resettled himself, resting his head on his arm. He regarded Cipher across the bed’s single pillow.

She was still asleep. Her cybernetics were black, powered off. It always looked like she’d fallen asleep wearing sun shades. He would have to wake her soon; they both needed to get back to work. Soon, but not now.

The impulse to let Cipher sleep a little longer was an excellent example of why this had been a mistake. He should have taken Cipher’s suggestion to fake the encounter for the sake of the guards.

He hadn’t, because—Because ultimately Zash was an excuse, a catalyst as it were, for a reaction that would have happened on its own eventually. Cipher was a heady mix of acquaintance and confidante. They existed in a high-stress environment where their lives had depended on each other for a long time and now did so again. She was a beautiful woman. She desired him when, if he was perfectly frank, he was at an age where being desired affected him deeply.

And Cipher was so very...

If the Jedi lived up their ideals instead of enforcing them only when convenient, she was what they would be.

As a young agent, freshly transferred in from the Navy, he’d made a soldier’s assessments. He’d been more free with the kill-shot than Cipher was, less likely to complicate his mission with helping other branches, and a damned sight more willing to use torture to get the job done. Cipher was a doctor first and an agent second. She was trustworthy and self-sacrificing in an agency that breathed secrets, lies, and the unique brand of selfishness that was politics.

Cipher was also loyal. Even set free, she had returned to him of her own free will.

Keeper’s wife was Chiss aristocra: if Keeper fell into political disfavor, she would not be around for the mess to touch her. He loved Marielle dearly for it, because it meant their son would always be safe. That didn’t make the unfailing quality of Cipher’s loyalty any less moving. It had been almost a decade since he’d had someone in his life he could rely on to follow him into a rancor den.  

Furthermore, Cipher’s idealistic approach worked. Balmorra should have been a bloodbath, but Cipher and Sanju had managed to keep civilian casualties well under Watcher Two’s best predictions. The Flame, the un-killable thorn in the Imperial side, was a harmless farmer now. General Cheketta had not only been convinced to make a full confession of Republic involvement but also to beg the Republic not to interfere further. In Axis they now had an ally inside the Hutt’s holonet. The Shadow Council was firmly on the Empire’s side, as was Nem’ro.

Once, he had been certain his old partner’s ideals would fade with time. Now he found himself hoping they would not, even though those ideals would invariably bring Cipher into direct conflict with the Sith.

Keeper would have to come up with a plan to protect her when that inevitable conflict occurred. He would spend Cipher’s life for the Empire as willingly as he would spend his own, but he would not waste it on Sith pride.

Keeper pushed an errant curl behind Cipher’s ear. The touch was enough to wake her.

Keeper slid from the bed.

“Instead of setting course for Tatooine,” he instructed, “I would like you to head to Alderaan first. The Moff in charge is of securing the planet is floundering. He may as well hand Alderaan back to the Republic as a gift. I will call ahead under the guise of not wanting to step on jurisdictional toes, and ‘accidentally’ bring up your considerable diplomatic skills. With any luck, he will dump the entire mess on you as soon as you walk in the spaceport. Without luck, ‘accidentally’ fix his mess in the process of finding the terrorists.”

“Understood,” Cipher said. She sat up. Her cybernetics flared their usual red.

Her hair still had a life of its own even if her quick wit had been tamed. Given the time and equipment it took Marielle to tame a similar mass in the mornings, it was impossible that Cipher would be able to rebuild her severe hairstyle in the guest accommodations. So much for discretion.

Hanged for a credit, hanged for a speeder. Cipher was right: this situation was going sideways no matter what they did.

Keeper bent and pressed a quick kiss to her mouth.

“Ask the guards for two meals while I use the fresher.”

Cipher nodded.

The guest shower was stocked with samples of cleaning supplies. He washed quickly so as not to use what was probably a meagre supply of hot water. It had been a while since he had field-shaved with a shiv, but he was pleased to find he had not lost the skill.

When he left the bathroom, Cipher was laying across the end of the bed, her shapely legs bent at the knee. She’d been watching. Keeper reflexively masked how pleasing that was, drawing himself to at-ease.

“We have about an hour until the food arrives,” Cipher stated. Her cheeks flushed pink. Keeper was amused. It was so much more difficult to be bold when you meant it.

They had only slept a few hours, not nearly long enough for Keeper to be able to get erect again. Still, he did not need his penis to sate Cipher.

“You’re spoiling me for other men, sir,” Cipher purred happily afterward. She was positively glowing. Keeper massaged his wrists. He deserved the ache for showing off.

“So long as you can still get them to cooperate, I have no complaints.” He could not give sexual fidelity to anyone, so he did not demand it. Marielle had made the adjustment well.

Cipher snorted in an aborted laugh. She rolled off the bed to head to the fresher. Keeper washed his hands while she bathed. He pulled on his undershirt and pants.

The guard gave him a look of begrudging respect when he opened the door to receive the mess trays. It was satisfying, even if he would never admit it aloud.

“I have no illusions that is actually bantha,” Cipher said as she pulled on her uniform. “But it smells good.”

“It is a Sith mess,” Keeper pointed out. “I’m sure they would not settle for military mystery meat.” This was satisfying as well; having the awkward uncertainty resolved. His asset had changed, as had he, but at least they were asset and handler again.

“I’m going to head straight to the Phantom,” Cipher said once they had finished their meal. She had pulled her hair back into a messy plait. “Kaliyo will have quite a lot to say, and I ask that you ignore it.”

“You are my protégé,” Keeper pointed out. “I am certain a sizeable share of HQ believes we were sleeping together already.”

Cipher snorted.

“You are not going to cross her mind as a possibility, sir.”

Aliens. There was a reason most of them ended up slaves.

“Correct any misapprehension as you need,” Keeper stated.

~*~

No one at HQ inquired about his absence, and Keeper offered no explanation. By the time he had worked through the backlog his sudden break had caused, Zash had sent him a message.

“My guards inform me you were quite thorough in accomplishing your task. It is appreciated.”

She had included a decent credit transfer, doubtlessly intended as a tip.

He wasn’t certain whether to be insulted or not. Given Zash’s reputation, Keeper accepted the funds with polite thanks.

~*~

“Oh, so that’s what Zash meant by a reward. And here I thought you were just into Sanju’s type,” Kaliyo purred when she saw Cipher’s lack of makeup and impromptu hairstyle. She stepped close behind the agent and ran her hands down Cipher’s body once. “I’m not a tall blonde, Agent Blade, but if you ever need that itch scratched--”

Cipher reminded herself that she needed Kaliyo’s gun in the field and that petitioning her superior for a new asset less than a day after sleeping with him (twice) was both taking advantage and wildly improper.

“There will be no need,” Cipher said mildly. She stepped away from Kaliyo. “We have been diverted to Alderaan. Since you did try to stick up for me with Zash, if there are any suitably wealthy contacts we acquire, I will introduce you.”

“You know just what I like, Agent.”

Kaliyo slapped Cipher on the ass before she left the room.

Cipher breathed out. There wasn’t going to be an “if” to acquiring a suitably wealthy contact. She was going to find one. Preferably a little on the old side and taken with Kaliyo’s exotic looks.

~*~

Cipher’s report on Alderaan did not disappoint: she had secured support for Thul using Alderaan’s own customs, destroyed Ulgo’s rebellion, and secured the crown for House Panteer so that Thul could be crowned in full accord with Alderaanian custom. The only downside was that the Killiks would do no more for the Empire until their price of a new hive had been paid. Cipher recommended that once House Ulgo was eliminated completely that their structure be provided as payment.

He also had two letters of commendation in his inbox: one from Captain Lieber, praising Cipher for stating an alliance as her chosen payment for the crown instead of credits. The second was from Moff Sarek.

Cipher’s report had also included a footnote: Kaliyo had shown interest in leaving Intelligence employ for House Cortess. However, after the discovery that his wife had been funding terrorists, the head of House Cortess had backed out. Cipher’s frustration was palpable.

Cipher had spoken highly of Vector Hyllus, the Diplomatic Services agent with whom she’d worked. With the Oroboro Nest negotiations at a standstill, there was no reason for Vector to remain on Alderaan.

It was playing favorites a tad, but Cipher _had_ handed Alderaan to the Empire wrapped in a bow made of their own honor.

Keeper placed a call to Diplomatic Services headquarters.

~*~

On Tatooine she’d taken apart the Eagle’s last cell, the Ghost Cell. Unlike Kaliyo, Vector had approved of letting Mia go at the end. It was a nice change.

“You seemed very certain The Old Man would not be able to fool Intelligence?” Vector inquired as they’d travelled to Hutta to destroy the Eagle’s Nest.

Cipher looked down at the medpack she was crafting.

“He was right: a Cipher’s life is all a lie. That can and does sometimes lead to psychological instability. Your handler prevents that. He is your grounding-rod and touchstone. And it is his job to notice any psychological instability, either to fix it or have you retired – not to write it off. There is no closer bond.”

“We understand,” Vector said gently. “Keeper would not have been fooled.”

“No.” The image of the holo-disguised Old Man being kissed by Keeper popped into Cipher’s mind. The Old Man’s imagined horror made her smile. Vector tilted is head, staring at her with his blackened eyes.

“We do not understand, but we are pleased your mood has improved.”

~*~

Artus had been a frelling nightmare, a complete cluster-frak without the pleasure part.

“The human cost is acceptable,” Watcher Two had argued.

“The human cost is not acceptable to me!” Cipher had fired back. Not only was it far from a certainty that allowing Jadus to enact his plan would in any way increase the odds of his capture, but that volume of casualties – there would be no way to keep it quiet. They might as well hang up a holosign on their borders: “Imperial civil war imminent: Galactic Republic, invade at your leisure.”

Cipher had shut down the Eradicators. Jadus had escaped, but the Empire had been saved.

Far from Keeper bearing the burden of Jadus’ escape, the Minister of Intelligence had been blamed for not noticing Jadus’ corruption in the first place. Keeper had been chosen as his replacement.

It was the highest position any non-Sith could achieve in the Empire. There was no one more qualified. She was happy for Keeper. She was. It didn’t change the fact they had only been together again for a few months and already she was looking down the blaster-barrel of another goodbye.

“The Dark Council has chosen Watcher Two as my replacement,” Keeper had told her when she’d returned to Dromund Kaas after “Eradication Day.” His voice was gentle. It had the same strange quality to it as when he’d told her about being a corpsman. “She is young for the position. As a eugenic creation, she tends to mismanage the emotional component of our work. I expect you to support her as if I was still in this office.”

“Of course, sir.” Her voice cracked slightly on the last word. Cipher cleared her throat.

“Our last farewell proved temporary,” Keeper said. “I see no point in saying one now.”

Cipher drew her fingertips over his knuckles where they rested on the small box that held his possessions.

“Then I will follow your lead.”


	8. Cipher Nine and The Minister of Intelligence

Losing a handler, even to promotion, was a devastating blow for any cipher operative. Cipher knew she shouldn’t resent the old Watcher Two simply for not being the old Keeper, but she did. Stepping into the new Keeper’s office for the first time after her leave had ended had only reinforced that perception. The Keeper’s office was for agents, most of whom had just been through something hideous. The floor rug, wood desk, and hanging tapestries had created enough warmth to encourage frankness. Watcher Two had removed them all and replaced the desk with a wired computer terminal.

Still, the Minister had asked her to make this easy on the ex-Watcher Two. The new Keeper’s success was the best thing for Intelligence. Cipher was determined to form a relationship with her new handler.

After a brief exchange of pleasantries, Keeper had proceeded to update Cipher on what had transpired during Cipher’s absence. Some of it Cipher had known, some not.

“I never thought I’d miss the old Keeper,” Cipher had said wistfully afterward. The sentence structure was a joke, but her tone was anything but light. If the new Keeper missed the old Keeper as well, she would have a chance to voice it. Shared loss was a powerful feeling for building attachment, whether it was to assets, marks, or agents. Even if the ex-Watcher did not miss the old Keeper, it would be in her best interest as Cipher’s new handler to fake it.

“The new Minister is looking for a secretary, if you prefer his company,” Keeper said angrily, with a mocking emphasis on ‘secretary.’ “If you want a wartime assignment, you work for me.”

_Sith’s blood_ , Cipher thought to herself. The over-reaction reeked of insecurity. Worse, the bulk of agent defections happened within the first six months of the loss of a handler when the new handler botched building trust with the agent.

The new Keeper wasn’t botching Cipher Nine’s transition so much as stabbing it with a shiv and leaving it to die in a pool of its own blood.

The Minister had not been lying about the new Keeper and the emotional component of her work. If anything, his words had been a massive understatement.

Vector was now the closest thing Cipher had to a handler, in the grounding-sanity sense. Vector wasn’t trained for it. But he was Joined, which gave him a unique wisdom. Hopefully it would be enough.

From there the briefing went only downhill.

The new Keeper was going after her SIS counterpart, something that the old Keeper hadn’t even attempted at the zenith of his career. Worse, Keeper’s plan was nothing short of bantha-shit crazy. No one who could reach and hold Kothe’s position would be so naïve as to believe a senior Cipher agent would turn scant weeks into a war.

Refusing orders in wartime was a death-sentence. She had to give this ill-conceived mission her best. But she wasn’t going to sit there and quietly implode along with Intelligence because the new Keeper was trying too hard.

She sent the Minister the second-angriest sentence she’d ever directed at him:

“You better have that secretary spot open for me if I come back from this. Sir.”

His reply was simple.

“The position is yours if you wish it, of course. I will monitor the situation which prompted your letter closely.”

~*~

Tearing apart Nem’ro’s droid factory – destroying the very thing she’d built that first mission on Hutta – was literally sickening. Her stomach was knotted, and her pheromones apparently conveyed such distress that Vector had reiterated his apprehension over the mission.

Then Kothe had dismissed Vector and introduced her to his brainwashing program. Watching her body literally jump when told, hearing her voice acknowledge the man’s orders even though her brain seethed—

Of course, Kothe hadn’t trusted her defection. He would have been a fool to, it was what made this mission such a monumentally bad idea. Kothe’s backup plan was worse than even Cipher had imagined, true, but the root cause was still the same. By the time she had set course for Taris, what had been a flashfire expression of anger had hardened into cold resolve. She would fetch caffa and drop off laundry for an eternity before she would take one more order from that woman.

But first she had to shake Kothe’s control.

When she arrived on Taris she would be Legate. For now, she was still Cipher Nine.

Cipher gave Kaliyo the bridge and closed the door to her quarters. She engaged the lock.

The Minister had been Minder Four when one of their dead-drops had contained information about records of a Jedi brainwashing program. The smuggled records had been clear that the brainwashing hadn’t been completely successful. Cipher knew now, having spent time among the Revanites, that those records had been speaking of Darth Revan.

The Revanite Master had said she would have to find her own way to follow Revan’s path. Apparently, that was going to be more literal than figurative.

The Minister hadn’t been surprised the then-unnamed Sith hadn’t stayed under. Why?

Cipher Nine stilled her mind, trying to recall the conversation.

Something about the Jedi mind-trick not being full-proof. But surely the failure of one method did not perforce mean all methods were flawed? The Minister had to have had more than that…

Cipher changed tactics. Things often came to mind while the mind was otherwise occupied. What did she know of how Revan had regained control?

Well, Revan was a Force-user, for one. Cipher was tempted to discount Revan’s success based on Cipher’s own force-blindness, but the Revanite Elder Jhorval had been certain the Force was relevant to even force-blinds.

“Life creates the Force, makes it grow,” Jhorval had said. “Its energy surrounds us and binds us. The Force is all around us: between Ladra, Torrun, the rock, the tree – everywhere. Even between you and I. We are luminous beings, not this crude matter. The Force lives, breathes, guides us in our will and works toward accomplishing its own. Even after these fleshy corpses fade and rot, we live on in its memory.”

“You mean the Force is alive?” she had asked.

“Very much so. There are two sides to the Force: dark and light. It is forever working toward balance. One side calls to each one of us more than the other, but it is ultimately our choice which side to heed when. You will not be able to feel the Force in the same way a user does, but it is still a part of you simply because you are alive. Close your eyes. Still your mind. Look within. Feel the side that calls to you.”

The light had been pale, fainter than the briefest spark. But Cipher had felt it then, and at other times: in moments of particularly profound compassion, loyalty, or mercy. It was stronger now than it had been then. It was still far too weak to make any use of. She was no Sith, no Jedi, and never would be. But the Force lived, and in that pale white light at her core, so did she.

The living Force had been part of then-Minder Four’s objection to mind control. He had spent enough time around Sith and fighting Jedi to believe in its will and its willingness to influence people as needed.

“We all have a base nature, like the Force,” he had said. “It exists outside our wills; we cannot change it no matter how we try. There may someday come technology or technique that will allow us to control a human’s mind. But if we tell that person to do something that goes against their very nature?” He had shaken his head. “The conflict would leave a crack in the brainwashing’s control. Not enough for outright refusal, perhaps. Enough to behave erratically enough to raise suspicion, to sabotage the mission, to kill themselves, to exploit loopholes in the orders given so that the brainwashing could be undone? Certainly.”

Loyalty the Empire, to the Minister, was her base nature.

The brainwashing was ordering her to betray them both.

She didn’t know if Watcher X’s voice in her head was her own will manifesting itself through the crack created by that conflict, if it was the result of the chip he’d implanted on Nar Shaddaa, or even if it was the part of him that lived on in the Force. It didn’t matter. The voice had told her to wait, to bide her time, because the opportunity would come.

The voice was correct. Every act against the Empire Kothe ordered her to take was one more conflict between her dominated will and her nature. Each conflict would maintain, if not increase, the weakness in control Watcher X’s voice represented.

Eventually, Cipher would be free.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, the author knows only Force-users have appeared as force-ghosts. Cipher, however, would not.


	9. Legate and the Minister of Intelligence

The first kernel of a concrete plan came from Vector while en route to Taris.

“We had our first protein bar since Joining the nest,” Vector said. It was his turn for laundry duty and her turn to unload the supply drop.

To his Killik-enchanced senses, he related, the meal had been a sumptuous experience.

It was still just a protein bar. The juxtaposition made her smile despite herself and the dire situation. It was almost… sweet.

“We are not sure of our place here,” Vector had continued. He explained to Legate that Keeper had told him his positon would be combat-oriented, which Vector’s duties as Dawn Herald permitted. But what else was he?

“You tell me,” Legate said seriously. “I’m still learning about you and your abilities. How do you see yourself?”

“For most of our life, we were a diplomat. We do not think we should set that aside so easily.”

“I know how you feel,” Legate said after a long pause, focusing her gaze on the boxes she was putting away. “I am a doctor who spends very little time healing.”

Vector had nodded.

“Do you have a family? Brothers, sisters—husband?” The inquiry wasn’t subtle, and delivered with a bashfulness that Legate herself was only still capable of with one person.

“Vector, are you asking me if I am single?”

“Well—yes. We would like to know.”

Legate could say it was none of his business or state simply that she was unmarried. But at some point she would have to seduce someone in front of him: it was the nature of the job. She did not want him to feel jealous or that he had been rejected.

She also respected him too much to lead him on. The first place in her heart was taken, even though the one who held that place was hardly a mate.

“There is someone at home, yes, though that doesn’t stand in my way,” she had said. Then elaborated when he’d been confused, “an agent must use all skills in her possession.”

“You have a very utilitarian view of the world, Agent,” Vector had said. “We look forward to familiarizing ourselves with it.”

By the time the chores were complete, Vector had another question.

“You call Watcher Two your handler now, but your song is discordant to your words. You do not sing to her as you did to the old Keeper. Is your ‘strongest bond’ still to him?”

Though expressed in Killik terms, the perceptiveness of the question took her breath away.

“Yes,” she said. She had wanted to say more, to tell Vector everything and plead with him to use his diplomatic channels to get a message to the Minister, but the brainwashing had stilled her voice.

The Minister had said that it was possible someone brainwashed could behave erratically enough to be noticed. Keeper was an incompetent handler: she would write off anything Legate did as trying to fit in with the SIS crew. Even if she did notice the instability, she would not risk her plan by recalling Cipher.

Vector knew her, and he was a diplomat trained to look for subtleties that didn’t match spoken word. He knew what a handler’s job was and that Legate did not consider Keeper her handler.

Vector wasn’t trained to be a handler. There was a strong chance he would rely on Keeper’s judgment. It was a slim hope, a barest simulacrum of a plan that depended far too heavily on Vector’s diplomat training and Killik instincts.

It was still a plan.

The first thing Legate did was borrow clothes from Kaliyo. Ciphers were given free choice as to whether to wear their uniform or plainclothes. Legate always wore her uniform, on or off duty, unless her cover directly demanded she didn’t. The sudden wardrobe change drew attention. When asked why, Legate tried to tell them the truth. The brainwashing made her say instead that she “wanted a change.”

Legate focused hard on her fear and anger so her “song” would be discordant with her words even as her voice spoke the lie.

The second thing she did when she landed on Taris was turn down the military’s request for help subjugating the planet. That got Vector’s attention, because not once in all their time together had Legate ever refused another branch’s request for help. She refused civilian requests for aid as well.

Every time Vector regarded her changed behavior with a troubled gaze, she tried to tell him the truth even as the brainwashing forced lies through her lips.

The constant struggle was exhausting. By the third day she wanted nothing more than to go home. There was a headache between her eyes, and a loneliness in her heart that hadn’t been there since her first week of medical school on Manaan.

By the end of their fifth day on Taris, Legate either hit the biggest stroke of luck since Verzau’s decision to greet her on the roof, or else the Force was truly with her.

Chance said he had the codes but promised not use them over the holo while Vector had been standing at her shoulder. He had heard the entire conversation. It was an unfathomably careless mistake on Chance’s part. Then, not four hours later, Chance had used the codes to force her to come to Dynamet General (even though she was already moving to intercept) – again, with Vector standing not a foot behind her. Once she’d arrived, Chance had tried to use them a second time: this time, in Vector’s physical presence.

The Republic soldiers, for all their vaunted tolerance, had apparently been swayed by Vector’s Killik mannerisms to write him off as a fool, or else naïve, despite his Diplomatic Service history.

A significant part of Legate had wanted to let Chance die. It would be one less person who could control her. But the conflict between her programming and her core nature was the source of her resistance. If she herself began making compromises against that nature… it could only weaken her.

Furthermore, if the Force did aid force-blinds as Jhorval believed, she didn’t want to risk alienating the light with dark-side cruelty.

Most importantly: a doctor in chains was still a doctor.

“I should let you die for forcing me here,” the brainwashing let her say, “but I’m merciful.” She had patched Chance up and sent him on his way.

“He still has control, but now he trusts you,” Watcher X’s voice whispered in her mind after. When she asked it who it was, it did not reply.

It didn’t matter. Vector had seen everything. Believing her crazy would only make him more likely to seek the Minister’s aid.

~*~

By the time they had closed in on Ki Sazen’s position, Kothe showed his true colors: redeeming or even punishing Sazen was ultimately irrelevant. All he wanted was the transmitter.

At least the Sith were up-front about the fact everyone was disposable.

Kothe had used her brainwashing codes to make the transmitter the priority. He’d said nothing that could prevent Legate from sending Sazen to the Empire.

“She will find a home for her people in the Empire,” Vector said happily as Sazen departed with the Nikto she had left. “You did the right thing.”

_The keyword you keep hearing is a brainwashing code._

“I know,” Legate said instead.

~*~

By the time Doctor Lokin settled in, the headache between her eyes wouldn’t quit. It didn’t stop her from trying to buck the brainwashing’s control.

Kothe faked concern over her haggard appearance and gave her leave to check in with her Imperial bosses. By the time the holocall ended the hallucination had begun: every contact, every monster she’d faced as Cipher Nine. At the end her handler shot her in the back in his Minister’s uniform. That part had felt real.

Legate could barely focus on Watcher X. The hallucination didn’t even know what he was. He knew only that he was there because he had been the one to warn her this day was coming.

Watcher X also knew it was the Empire who had done this. The Sith were obsessed with developing a mind-control power of their own to equal that of the Jedi. The Republic had only capitalized on that research. The answers were on Dromund Kaas.

~*~

Legate gave Vector leave to search for his lost colony of Killik. His duties as Dawn Herald were important and deserved respect, true, and it also spared her for thinking up a story for why she was going to be breaking into Intelligence Headquarters. She sent Doctor Lokin along as a bodyguard and medic in her absence. Sending Lokin also meant Vector, who did not trust the doctor, could keep an eye on him.

When told what they’d be doing on Dromund Kaas, Kaliyo was ecstatic.

“Let’s go down the list: Rholl, check. Yjal, check. Ta Tigal, check. The Meanace, check. You and me are freaking queens of the galaxy, and now we’re going to pull off the biggest job of my career.”

“You manipulated me into cleaning up your past,” Cipher corrected.

“A flash of style, and then the starch, every time.” Kaliyo shook her head. “You really need to get laid. Not someone you’re trying to manipulate into doing the Empire’s dirty work or keep quiet. Recreationally, good and hard. We have to make a fuel stop before we hit Dromund Kaas. We should head out to a cantina while we’re there. I know just the place.”

“Someone like me doesn’t spend much of her off-duty hours in cantinas.”

“That’s the point. It’ll be fun.”

“You have fun. I’ll pass.”

Kaliyo sighed.

“Maybe bug-boy will come along before his shuttle-trip to nowhere.”

~*~

The brainwashing made Legate tell Kaliyo to wait outside the room, out of earshot, while she pulled the files. On the one hand, Legate didn’t like it because it meant Kaliyo was as completely unmonitored in the records hall as Legate was. It was the Dark Temple to a brick she was going to help herself and sell what she found to the highest bidder.

On the other hand, having Kaliyo out of earshot when the first holo had begun to play was fortunate. There was a zero percent chance her utter devastation at seeing the Minister coolly approve “Castellan Restraints” did not show on her face.

_Why?_ He was her handler, her partner; she’d even offered to kill Zhorrid for him, why could he possibly think he needed to do this? How could he?

The holo provided the answer: the Dark Council. Legate had looked at Jadus and thought she could defeat him in a fight, and she almost had. They wanted her to have an off switch they could use whenever they wanted.

Onomotophobia. The fear of a word. She’d thought it a cruelty on Kothe’s part, choosing the word for fearing a word because he was going to teach her to fear. Knowing the word was chosen by the Minister at the Council’s behest—

The strange quality in the Minister’s voice when they’d said goodbye in his office was now identifiable. He’d been afraid: of what he was going to do, of whatever the Council had threatened to make him agree to it, of what the Council would make her do simply because they could.

The thought was sudden and irrational, but a vivid picture flashed into Legate’s mind of Zash using the keyword to make Legate carry out the Minister’s execution just to make it as painful as possible for them both. Kothe wouldn’t hesitate, if he ever found out the Minister trusted her.

_Focus on the job,_ Legate told herself.

The Minister must have had his blaster hidden in the box on his old desk. He’d shot her when Legate had turned her back to leave. Legate was certain of it even though she couldn’t remember.

The Dark Council’s involvement also meant her plan to convince Vector to contact the Minister was useless. The Minister would know the Dark Council’s plan had gone terribly awry, true, but he would not be able to do a thing to help her.

Watcher X was right: she had no allies beyond her team.

The rest of the files were helpful. The brainwashing was done by means of a serum which took thirty days to take effect. That was why her head had hurt while she’d spent her leave paying off and talking down Kaliyo’s exes. There was no reversal, but she could change the keyword to one Kothe and the Dark Council didn’t know. All she needed was chemicals from Quesh.

~*~

She and Kaliyo made quick work of Quesh. Afterward Kaliyo pitched the idea of leaving Intelligence and going independent.

Legate had always pictured herself as Intelligence. Now, with the Dark Council having forced the Minister into brainwashing her and Keeper foolishly losing the damn brainwashing code to the Republic—Kaliyo’s idea was… tempting.

The Serum IX headache was worse the second time.

She and Kaliyo rendezvoused with Vector and Lokin. Vector’s mission had first seemed like a failure beyond warming Vector towards their team’s new mad scientist. Then the lost colony had contacted them, wanting to meet.

Legate had agreed because it was important to Vector, important to the Diplomatic Services, and because formally reuniting the Killik colonies would take a significant chunk out of her thirty-day wait for freedom.

The mission came with a delightful side-benefit: it turned out Killiks really knew how to throw a party. Vector also gathered enough information to draw up plans for a formal Killik-Empire alliance, a report Legate was all-to-happy to sign off on.

When Saber called, she demanded a reason for the long radio silence.

“Vector is Dawn Herald of the Oroboro Nest,” Legate said sweetly even as she thought, _I am going to toss you in a jail cell on Korriban and disintegrate the lock codes._ “Leaving the Empire does not change those responsibilities. Vector is my partner. We were searching for a lost Killik colony. We found them and are only just returning to Empire space.”

“Bug thing, got it,” Saber said. “Kothe needs you on Hoth. He’ll give you the details once you arrive.”


	10. Legate and the Minister: Quesh

Vector wished he had not promised to respect Cipher’s – Legate’s, he reminded himself – privacy.

The new Keeper _had_ said the mission would be psychologically taxing. Acting against the Empire to win Republic loyalty, even under pretense, certainly went against the grain. Her distress had abated on their sojourn to unite the Killik, which certainly suggested that her behavior was only due to the mission.

But every diplomat’s instinct in him said that it was more than that. The changes in attire, her complete refusal to help assist anyone outside the team, the almost constant use of stealth in the field. The sudden wild run through the ship followed by her collapse. Doctor Lokin said the medications she was dosing herself with were a med-droid approved headache remedy, but surely weeks on end after a collapse signified a problem?

And then there was the Republic. Legate said “keyword: onomatophobia” was just a Republic code indicating mission significance. But whenever any of their SIS assets said it, the smell of Legate’s heartbreak was so powerful he wanted to weep.

If Legate were Killik, she would have been eaten by her nestmates weeks ago, both to end the threat her erratic behavior posed and to end her suffering.

He remembered from his time as a human the value of privacy and how unwelcome prying was. He was not her handler. It was not his place to press the issue.

Furthermore, he was not trained for this: how could he presume to know what was normal for this kind of mission and what was not? Keeper had called. She had spoken to Legate about her behavior.

“What does my mental state matter?” Legate had demanded in a scathing tone he had never heard her use with one of greater rank. “Even if I wanted to, it’s too late to pull out now, isn’t it?”

Even in the medbay with Lokin, unable to see Legate’s face, Vector had known that was a cry for help.

“It is. Remember your mission: you must find out what Kothe is planning. Then, and only then, are you to kill Ardun Kothe. Do not lose sight of those goals. Keeper out.”

They had all heard Legate punch the holo screen hard enough for the duraglass to crack. She had lacerated both her glove and her hand.

Keeper was trained to be a handler. She was an agent of great experience who had been promoted to chief spymaster in a nation at war. But Vector couldn’t help but think—

Legate was scrunched up on one of the beds in Lokin’s office, staring at the wall. Vector and Lokin were in the mess, such as it was, to give her some privacy. Kaliyo had disappeared, which shouldn’t be possible on a ship this size but somehow she managed.

“Twenty years ago,” Lokin said from his side of the table. “I received a call from Fixer Ninety-eight. He said that a Cipher agent had kidnapped a little girl from a street gang, wiped them out, replaced her name with a number, told her she was an asset serving the Empire, and then sold her to a Hutt-ran brothel for a year.”

“Monstrous,” Vector said.

“Keep in mind, tampering with another agent’s assets is a courts-martial offense. But this agent wasn’t just skimming a little off the top of his discretionary accounts, and even for an agent a child is still a child. Ninety-eight couldn’t do nothing. He took the girl and asked me to play decoy while he created a fake identity and dropped her off in a backwater orphanage where she would be safe. I knew the Cipher agent by reputation: he was a cold-blooded hotshot from a rich family whose transfer orders had come from up where the air was quite thin, if you take my meaning.”

“Someone used to his transgressions being overlooked, or made to disappear.”

“Exactly. I assumed I would lead him around by the nose for a couple days and drop him.”

Vector did not know where this story was headed or why, but demanding Lokin get to the point would be unfathomably rude.

“Two days in I take one step off my ship only to be shoved back inside and given the worst beating of my career, at least at that point,” Lokin said ruefully. “Somehow this agent had gotten out ahead of me, and he wanted his asset back. Fixers don’t work with assets, but I knew the rules. Whether you were deceiving them or they worked for you willingly, assets did so because you had convinced them to trust you more than they trusted their own judgment. Even if you had to kill them at the end of the mission, they weren’t toys. Earning extra credits by telling someone they were working for the Empire and then hiring them out as a prostitute?” Lokin shook his head. “I told him even the SIS wouldn’t do something so deplorable.”

“Did he come to his senses?” Vector asked.

“He looked at me like I was a droid on a scrap-heap, stood up, used my holocom to call headquarters, and told the Watcher on duty that I was a decoy and Fixer Ninety-eight had his asset.”

“So he hadn’t lied to the girl. She was an asset-on-file.”

“And he’d already filled out all the paperwork to end my career, even as an accomplice.”

“We assume you explained that you had been deceived,” Vector guessed.

“Oh, I hadn’t been deceived. I’m sure Ninety-eight had believed he was doing the right thing, and if he’d been correct he’d have been instantly forgiven. He was just wrong. The Watcher agreed to forget my part in it if I provided the location Ninety-eight was holding the captured asset.”

“Which you did.”

Lokin nodded.

“The Cipher agent asked for permission to kill on sight because not only had Ninety-eight compromised the asset’s next mission by wasting the time that should have been spent preparing her; but now the Cipher agent’s mission was also wrecked. He would now have to accompany the asset himself instead, since she wasn’t going to consent to being lent out to another agent for months -- if ever.

“Up until that point, I thought that redheads being especially fiery was a myth. But when we got to Ninety-eight’s safehouse he had bites on his hands, scratches on his cheeks and brow, and a broken nose. She was so uncooperative he was loading her on the shuttle in an animal cage for his own protection.” Lokin chuckled at the memory. “The Cipher agent didn’t even give him the option to surrender: one shot, one kill. The little girl was hysterical. I doubt she even noticed I was there.”

“We imagine so, even though the man killed was her captor,” Vector said.

“‘You lied,’” Lokin quoted, shaking his head. “‘You said I’d be safe with Ninety-eight and you lied,’ she kept screaming. The Cipher agent clamped a hand behind her head and another over her mouth to quiet her. She bit him hard enough to make him bleed. He didn’t even flinch. ‘I told him if he did anything to you I would kill him. I didn’t think he was stupid enough to test me. That was my mistake, but I did not _lie_ to you, Thirteen. I have already cleared it with Citadel: you don’t have to work with any other agents if you don’t want to. Now calm down and stop biting me.’”

Lokin was imitating the speech of the Cipher agent as he spoke, and the terse delivery was unmistakable.

“As I see it, that Keeper is trying to prove she’s big enough to fill his shoes, and that’s all she’s thinking about,” Lokin continued. “Legate is in no fit state and she knows it, but if she aborts without Keeper’s sign off? It’s treason and she dies. If she keeps trying to go through with this mission, she’s not going to make it. The best she can hope for is maybe she stops this ‘shadow arsenal’ on her way out.”

He had promised to respect Legate’s privacy.

But surely she would not mind—

“Excuse us,” Vector told Lokin. The newest member of their squad had the bridge. She was who Vector needed to see.

“Ms. Temple,” he asked, “the Chiss base is secret, but you have contact with Csilla? Without being detected?”

“Obviously,” Temple said. “Why?”

“Could you use that means to patch us into the Diplomatic Services substation on Alderaan?”

“Absolutely forbidden,” Temple refused.

“Please. We give you our word as a Joined Killik that Cipher Nine’s life depends on it. Can you do it?” Vector released his most desperate pheromones.

Temple thought about it.

“Twenty minutes is all I can give you,” she relented.

She left him alone for the actual call. The Diplomatic Services attaché on Alderaan knew Vector well. Upon Vector’s request, he immediately re-routed Vector to the Minister of Intelligence’s office.

He was greeted by a thin-faced man in an Intelligence uniform who identified himself as Kallin.

“This is Vector Hyllus with Imperial Intelligence and we need to speak to the Minister immediately. It is of the utmost urgency.”

“Do you have an appointment?” the secretary asked.

“No, Mr. Kallin, but this is an emergency. Please--”

“Everyone has an emergency here, everything is urgent.” The secretary was nonplussed. “The Minister is busy. If you want to speak to him, you’ll have to go through proper channels.”

“Please, tell him that Vector Hyllus is calling, we promise you--”

“His earliest available timeslot is six weeks from now.”

“If we could wait six weeks we would have made an appointment and this wouldn’t be an emergency,” Vector said. His twenty minutes were going to expire on this ignorant little functionary before he even got to the Minister.

It was a terrible risk: the functionary’s desk could be out of earshot of the Minister’s office, the Minister might not be in, and there were a lot of females with red hair in the galaxy. Just because Legate – Cipher Nine – was loyal to the Minister didn’t mean she had to be the little asset. Hell, he didn’t even have confirmation that Cipher agent was the current Minister, or that the Minister would be moved by the relationship he had once had with Cipher. All he had was a gut feeling.

Still, Vector boosted the gain on the outgoing signal to its maximum and spoke as loudly as he could without risking Raina Temple hearing him.

“Please, just tell him this is about Thirteen!”

“Sir, you are clearly upset,” Kallin said, rubbing his ear. “I suggest—erk.” The last sound was made when an arm appeared behind him, its hand on the back of Kallin’s neck.

“It is time for your mealtime break, Kallin,” the Minister said coldly. “We will discuss this when you return.” Kallin exited the holocall field. After a few moments, the Minister appeared. “Why hasn’t Cipher Nine contacted me herself?”

“She can’t. We are routed through two Diplomatic Services substations, a half-dozen proxies, and the Chiss Ascendancy to avoid detection. We don’t have much time. We are on a deep-cover mission with a Republic SIS team codenames Saber, Wheeler, Hunter, and Ardun Kothe.” The Minister’s eyebrows shot skyward. “Cipher Nine’s behavior is erratic: she has stopped wearing her uniform and helping those outside mission parameters. She wants to abort but Keeper refused. We need help. We are en route to Quesh. The Republic agents keep saying ‘keyword: onomatophobia.’ It upsets her greatly but she will not tell us why.”

“What?” the Minister said in almost a whisper, his gaze sharpening like a tree-python sighting prey and _rock-lice_ that was a Republic code for an important mission. “Listen to me: should Cipher Nine attempt to kill herself you must not interfere. If she asks you to kill her, do not hesitate. Can you comply?”

It wasn’t the answer he was hoping for, but the Minister’s song was one of great importance. It was no different than a Killik would ask of a nestmate. Did Cipher mean any less to him?

“We can, sir,” Vector promised.

“I will do what I can on my end. Do not tell her you spoke to me under any circumstances or you will get her killed. Minister out.”

~*~

Kaas City.

Home. It was where she’d been born, where the closest thing her brother had to a grave was. The un-lived-in space she’d nearly died in that had become her first apartment, shared with her tutor between missions. She’d learned to cook, to balance a budget, had her first biology lesson in that tiny space. She couldn’t talk to K’sella without breaking her post-retirement alias, but Legate still checked up on her old tutor from time to time. K’sella’s three grandchildren lived in the city.

Legate’s favorite makeup shop and Amberlin, the clerk who always remembered zhrell-based makeup made Cipher rash. Amberlin’s first child would have just been born by now. The little caffa cart on the corner near her apartment complex, the retired janitor she sometimes played dejarik with in the park on her days off.

The Citadel, with its graceful spires that sighed when the wind blew from the south. Home to the Mandalorian government, the Dark Council, Imperial Intelligence.

It was also home to the Minister’s office.

“That won’t work,” Legate told Kothe desperately, “bomb the Citadel, bomb the Academy on Korriban,” (please, please bomb the Academy instead if you must bomb something) “the Sith are just going to want revenge.” The loss of either would be crippling, for a time, but hardly a deathblow. 

“Maybe. If we have to fight, we’ll fight. Keyword: onomatophobia. Hold position.”

Kothe wanted her to return to the Empire and shore up her contacts, and he’d be in touch after the dust cleared.

He honestly thought after murdering almost everyone she cared about that she would give half a damn about anything he had to say.

Legate still had ten days left on the serum. Her body wasn’t moving even though her soul wanted to be running across the base as fast as she could.

“Cipher?” Lokin asked. “Are we really standing here and letting them leave?”

_No. Shoot me and run, you were an agent, you know this is wrong!_

The Shadow Arsenal was undetectable. There would be no evacuation. If the Minister was lucky he’d be killed instantly without even knowing anything was awry. If he wasn’t lucky he’d burn to death, suffocate, or be crushed under the rubble until he died of thirst.

Kothe wasn’t making her pull the trigger. He was just going to make her watch.

Cipher couldn’t move. No matter how she tried to drag her feet so much as a millimeter across the floor they wouldn’t go.

The Jedi’s mind-trick and the Sith mind-reading were neither of them full-proof. Legate had resisted both to some extent. She knew there was always a point where the Force would back off, even for Force-blinds. The Castellan restraints were unyielding.

 _Please,_ Legate screamed at the Force silently even though she knew that wasn’t how it worked. _Please, if Jhorval is right, if you are alive at all you know that this is sick and should not be! I know I am no Jedi or Sith but please, help me!_

The white light wasn’t a spark. It was a many-pointed star that burned.

Watcher X appeared in golden light beside her.

“You’re out of time, they’ve won. The serum is circulating through your system, making neural connections, bleaching your brain. It’s not finished, but it will have to do.”

_Thank you._

Watcher X chose “iconoclasm” for her keyword. He gave her a choice with what to do with it. He could make her a weapon like none other or simply set her free.

“No more outside control,” Legate chose without hesitation.

Watcher X almost seemed to smile.

“Reject user interface. Accept no further commands.” There were other questions, and Watcher X recommended she find answers. Then he bid her farewell and disappeared into the white light.

“Cipher,” Lokin was saying as she returned to the present. He rattled off her vitals easily, and his diagnosis that she wasn’t dying. Legate had been right to believe she would collapse again once the second dose took effect, to bring Lokin instead of Vector.

She still had ten days left: the omnipresent headache was still there. But she was free. The endorphin rush would carry her through anything.

“Actually,” Cipher said, “I feel better than I have in a long time. Follow my lead.”

Lokin smiled. He was a rakghoul before they reached the door.

Killing Saber and Wheel would take too long and serve no purpose. Using sparing Chance to convince them of her trustworthiness was faster, and it also kept them from tipping off Kothe.

Not that it mattered. By the time she reached Kothe the spark of light was a burning star in her breast again.

“Legate. I thought I sensed you. You’re supposed to be back at the shields.” His head tilted. “I see. You’re free, aren’t you?” Kothe said. He turned around.

“Your keyword won’t work anymore,” Cipher said. Her voice was heavy with judgment.

“What I did to you was unforgiveable, but I did it anyway.” Kothe had a string of rationalizations. He had the decency to admit he’d betrayed his Jedi ideals, but that shred of decency was far too little far too late.

“Your mission has failed. You’re not getting the Shadow Arsenal.”

“I don’t believe that.”

She had faced Darth Jadus and walked away under her own power. Kothe had betrayed the light without committing to the dark. He was neither Jedi nor Sith. He was just a man holding a lightsaber. Kothe could block her blaster shots if he held position or fell back, but he couldn’t seem to attack at the same time. As soon as he advanced, her shots slipped through. His Force throws-barely moved her and Lokin a scant few feet. His lightsaber strikes lacked the usual heft of a Force user. There were no acrobatic tricks.

“You fight good, Cipher,” Kothe choked when he fell. His torso was a bloody mass and his left leg wouldn’t stop shaking.

“Stand down or die,” Cipher said.

“Promise me, if the Empire wins this, that you will be gracious,” Kothe said. He lunged for a final attack, limping backwards as he blocked her shots.

Cipher fired on the security controls. The shield rose, the cannons came online.

“There is no death,” Kothe said, accepting his fate. “There is the Force.”

Cipher highly doubted the Force was listening. The cannons fired.

“What will the Watchers do without Ardun Kothe to keep them up at night, plotting away?” Lokin asked lightly.

“We need to destroy these bombs,” Cipher said. Hunter as still unaccounted for.

“Agreed, or the Minister of War and the Science Bureau will fight for possession.”

Hunter interrupted on the holo.

“Cipher! Imperial again, huh? And no more programming, that is a surprise.” The man was furious and gloating at the same time. “I was finished with Ardun, but I had plans for you. We could have wandered the galaxy together – me as the captain, you as my servant.”

Hunter had been quite clear what he wanted to use her programming to make her do. They’d never been alone long enough for him to carry it out, save for on Hoth. Any attempt there would have frozen them both to death.

“The idea of going anywhere with you makes my skin crawl,” Cipher replied.

“Too bad. Big changes are coming. Imperial Intelligence and the SIS… history will forget them. And it will forget you. I just tipped off a squadron of Imperial bombers. This facility is about to be wiped out.”

_Thanks for the warning._

Cipher wasn’t waiting for Hunter to stop gloating, she just started running. Lokin was right behind her.

“Good bye, Cipher!” Hunter called. “When the bombs rain down, the Shadow Arsenal will make a fantastic crater.”

Kaliyo had disobeyed her orders to stay on the ship. She was on the wall, shooting the war droids ahead of them as they ran toward the main gate. Vector and Raina had the Phantom hovering beyond the wall.

“Haul ass, Agent!” Kaliyo shouted over the comm.

Cipher didn’t have the breath to shout back. The three of them jumped the last few feet into the ship. The Phantom began to rise before the airlock was even closed. Cipher could hear the bombs exploding. She, Kaliyo, and Lokin were lying on the deck, panting. There was a painful stitch in her side.

 “Oh, Force, why is he naked?” Raina demanded, covering her eyes.

Laughter took too much breath, but she could huff a little on the exhales.

Cipher pulled the pack containing Lokin’s field robe from her belt and dropped it on his chest. Cipher now knew what Lokin meant about his transformation needing preparation. Lokin could transform at will, but his clothes? Not so much. Whoever went with him in rakghoul form had to be prepared to carry a light robe around or deal with the nudity if he didn’t have time to strip before the first transformation.

“Agent,” Kaliyo panted. “You—and your squad—have grown on me--but—I want a raise for this.”

Cipher nodded. In that moment, everything was wonderful.

The holo was going off. The trill was more like a warbling beep, now. She’d hit it harder than she thought.

Cipher dragged herself down the hall and to her feet.

“Keeper to Cipher Nine. This is an emergency transmission, please respond. We’ve reports of a class-five annihilation wave on Quesh, triggered by an Imperial bombing run. Are you all right?”

A class-five wave. Kaas City would have been eliminated all the way to the Wall.

There was no brainwashing to still Cipher’s tongue now.

“I was nearly killed by Imperial incompetence and Imperial treachery,” Cipher spat, “But Ardun Kothe and his weapon, the Shadow Arsenal, are no longer a threat.”

“Updating the Minister now,” Keeper said. “Pulling two sections off alert, giving approval to the Moffs to accelerate our timetable. You can tell me the rest later. Take a couple of days off. Try to remember who you are while there is still a quiet place in the galaxy. By the time you return to headquarters we will be ready to march on Coruscant. Keeper out.”

Cipher was dumbfounded. The uniform change, the sudden lack of inter-agency cooperation, the thinly-veiled disrespect in Cipher’s speech – did Keeper honestly believe Cipher had lost herself in her cover, simply forgetting military discipline due to exposure to Republic sloppiness? Or was this her way of trying to remind Cipher to respect the chain of command?

Was Keeper deliberately trying to break her sanity?

No. That was just paranoia.

“You need to retire before that woman gets you killed,” Lokin grumbled from the hallway. He’d pulled his robe on, doubtless to Raina’s relief. “Ever thought about a career as a lab assistant?”


	11. Cipher Nine and the Minister: Dromund Kaas

Her two days off didn’t feel like a vacation: Kaliyo had indeed stolen information during Cipher’s break-in. Her betrayal wasn’t a surprise, but it still stung in places which had been rubbed raw by her time with SIS.

Cipher had no illusions Kaliyo would ever care for the Empire as Cipher did. But perhaps she would understand betraying the Empire would never be in her best interests.

Cipher’s official reports were carefully written. As far as Cipher said she knew, SIS had kidnapped Lokin from the Zetan wastes along with taking Dr. Cel. Upon realizing Cipher was Imperial, he had joined Cipher’s team rather than serve the Republic. It was the same story Lokin had told Cipher’s team: only Cipher knew he had come to Taris of his own volition.

Cipher was also quite clear in her report and to her team that she believed the brainwashing had been Ardun Kothe’s. In her report, she wrote that destroying the shield generators had been enough of a loophole to let her move to intercept Kothe despite his orders. She wrote that she believed the matter closed with his death.

Protocol demanded she debrief with Keeper upon arrival. All she wanted was to go home, use the fresher, and sleep through the last eight days of the serum IX. She could barely eat anymore.

Cipher was fighting the fear that the pain would never stop. What if that was the “inhibiting” physical side effect of repeated serum injections?

A Minder arrived to collect Vector, leaving Cipher alone in Keeper’s office.

A small red droid entered followed by—

Cipher drew herself to attention.

“It isn’t my office anymore, but Keeper is occupied and I thought we should talk. It’s been a long time, Agent.”

What should she say? What could she say? The walls of the Citadel had ears, and she was not prepared for what seeing him in person again would feel like.

There were a hundred things to tell him and another hundred questions to ask, and everything was caught in her throat because he had no way of knowing she knew about any of it.

Minister was an administrative position: logistics, paperwork, politics. It didn’t deal with the missions themselves beyond how the success and failure affected the whole and the Minister certainly did not handle agent debriefing. He shouldn’t be here, but he was. Unless--

“I wasn’t expecting you, sir. I haven’t seen you since--” _You shot me in the back and brainwashed me._ “—Eradicaiton Day. Keeper said you _had_ been promoted to Minister of Intelligence?”

“Yes,” the Minister said ruefully. “My wife says the position suits me.”

The word ‘wife’ hit her like a rancor claw to the gut, even though it shouldn’t have.

“Scan complete,” the droid intoned. “No listening devices found.”

“Remote: broadcast mode. White noise. Ten minutes, then leave.” The Minister looked back at Cipher. The casualness disappeared from his bearing. “We may as well be honest. I know about the stolen files. I know you discovered your brainwashing and freed yourself. And yes, I was responsible.” His words were terse and curt, spoken as quickly as his precise diction could allow.

How in the name of the Emperor--

“Why?” Cipher asked.

“The Sith wanted you under control,” the Minster stated coldly. “You survived Darth Jadus; how long before you defied another member of the Dark Council? The programming was a safeguard, and if I hadn’t approved it, you’d be dead. I don’t plan to tell anyone you’re free.”

His words should mean that he’d saved her life and her secret was safe. His delivery was all wrong. Everything felt surreal, like reality was moving on ahead of her and she was scrambling to catch up.  

“How did the SIS get my brainwashing code?”

“The Republic shouldn’t have Imperial brainwashing codes. Ardun Kothe’s shuttle was found abandoned in space without any data on your ‘Shadow Arsenal’ and according to our records there is no evidence of an agent ‘Hunter’ ever existing.” There was mockery in his voice, invisible quotation marks of disbelief.

Without the arsenal and Hunter, Cipher was just a traitor.

“Why would I lie about that?” Cipher couldn’t keep the despair out of her voice. “Why would my team back me?”

“I don’t doubt your story,” the Minister stated, pulling reality out from under her again. “Someone – either your Hunter or his employer – is manipulating this war for their own ends. Someone with access to both Republic and Imperial resources. This someone gave Ardun Kothe your keyword. We need to find out who and why.”

Hunter had said something about having plans for her. If he’d meant more than rape--

“I left Hunter on Quesh. But he is long gone now.”

“Fortunately, the trail is still warm. A man fitting Hunter’s description boarded a shuttle to the Isen Four asteroid colony. Nine hours ago, we received this message.” The Minister gestured to Remote, who played a message of a Mirialan man surrendering. “Our forces will arrive there tomorrow. I don’t know if the colony’s surrender is related to Hunter’s arrival, but I want you after him.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good. We’ll speak again soon.”

Cipher opened her mouth to ask—

But the Minister was already leaving the room, taking Remote with him and leaving Cipher feeling very much alone.

“Cipher, good,” Keeper said when she entered her office. “This is Fixer Ninety-eight. He’ll be conducting a psychological evaluation. I’ll debrief you after.” It was a different man, but the same designation. He should have been a Minder.

Keeper didn’t know Cipher’s history with that designation, but the Minister did.

He had said he believed her. He’d said he was sending her after Hunter and his employers. But this: this looked more like deliberately leaving her shaken before an interrogation.

Everything she had feared about this mission had come true. Kothe hadn’t believed her defection to the Republic and had used her. Keeper hadn’t told the Minister beforehand and now he didn’t believe her loyalty to the Empire.

The Minister could never care for a traitor.

Despair clawed at Cipher’s throat. She’d beaten the brainwashing and lost the Minister anyway. If they found her guilty of treason, then despite stopping the bombing she would still lose her home, her team, and her life.

The psychological evaluation was such in name only. Ninety-eight focused on Hunter’s taunts and malice to upset her, then asked about her actions against the Empire, then her collapse, then a series of pointless questions about prior missions, then back to Hunter. He repeated the cycle over and over again, making Cipher repeat herself, searching for inconsistencies. He made her stand at formal at-ease and offered no water, kept her talking even after she’d run herself hoarse. The Serum IX headache combined with Cipher’s physical and emotional exhaustion only made Ninety-eight’s approach more brutal.

Cipher was trained to resist interrogation. Still, by the time Keeper called a halt, Cipher’s legs were shaking so badly she had to ask Keeper for permission to sit for her debriefing.

“Of course, have a glass of water,” Keeper said, handing her a cup. “I have to apologize, Cipher. This is my fault. They’re not looking for psychological instability, they’re trying to prove you’re faking.”

“I told you to remember where my loyalties really lie,” Cipher whispered. She struggled to control her breathing. If she gave into the impulse to cry and passed out here--

“I do, I promise I do,” Keeper said urgently. She still had eyes to weep with, and they were bright with unshed tears. “I—We Watchers are eugenics creations. I went through the same training you did, but I never really understood the necessity for building trust or any of it. The mission and the Empire should be enough for anyone, I thought. You were such a consummate professional under the old Keeper that I didn’t think I needed to waste my time. You told me the mission had a major complication twice and I didn’t listen. I’m so sorry. I won’t make that mistake again.”

It was like seeing Zhorrid after the Council had humiliated her, small and broken and hurt. Zhorrid had done far worse than Keeper.

“It’s fine,” Cipher whispered.

“It’s not fine,” Keeper said, patting Cipher’s forearm, “but it is nice of you to say.”

“Can I go home?”

“Not until they analyze your results. You have to stay in the medbay for observation.”

Cipher breathed out long and slow. She could not conjure ice around this. Still, it was kind of Keeper to use the medbay instead of a cell.

“You don’t have to repeat everything again for me,” Keeper said. “Let’s get you a fresher and a fruit-gel cup.”

~*~

The med-droid gave her a kolto-gargle for her throat. He took away her gear during her go in the fresher. He provided a pair of standard-issue exercise pants and a uniform undershirt.

Cipher had crawled into bed before the droid could finish recommending rest.

She was awakened in the middle of the night by hands around her throat and a gag being pressed into her mouth.

Her assailants were four Sith bodyguards. 

Someone hadn’t believed her report about “Kothe’s” brainwashing.

Cipher fought back barehanded as best she could, struggling as she was forced to the ground and cuffed. One of the guards threw her over his shoulder. Cipher drove both hands into his lower back as hard as she could. The guard dropped. One of the others grabbed Cipher by the hair and dragged her.

Cipher had to hold on to his wrist with both hands to keep her scalp from being ripped. She tried to gain purchase on the stone floors as they hauled her away from medbay, but the soft pants and her bare feet had little in the way of traction.

When her assailants got her into the lift, they selected the basement floor.

Before the main holding and interrogation rooms had been built behind the Sith Sanctum, prisoners scheduled for enhanced interrogation had been held and tormented in the basement.

Snatching someone from bed in the middle of their sleep cycle and dragging them forcibly to a secondary location was a common means to prepare a subject for torture. It made the subject disoriented, heart racing with panic, and ensured they had no chance to mentally prepare for what was to come.

Cipher raised both legs and drove her bare heels into the guard ahead of her, straight into the backs of his knees. He went down. Cipher strained for his blade. Her fingers just brushed the handle—

One of the other guards kidney-punched her, and the other hit her in the stomach hard enough to wind her.

“Shutta’s a real pain.” The guard pulled sharply on her hair. There was a reason she wore it up-swept when she was expecting a fight.

Cipher was pulled down the hall. One of the doors opened. The cell extended barely a foot from the side of the bed. At the foot of the bed was a toilet. The sink was at the head of the bed.

The Minister was standing in the far corner, hands behind his back, expressionless.

He was wearing his jacket, though, which was good. He always took it off for torture. Shirts were cheaper if there was any blood spatter. There were also no torture implements in the room, but that didn’t mean much. He could get pretty creative with his bare hands.

The Sith guards threw her on the bed and closed the door. Cipher pressed her back to the wall.

The Minister began undoing the fastenings of his jacket.

Cipher’s heart was already pounding. This was happening. She slowed her breathing as her training had taught her. This was happening. She couldn’t talk if he was working for the Dark Council, so she’d just have to endure.

He would break or dislocate her fingers first. The golden hours for nerve damage would create a ticking clock. If she resisted too long, knowing she would never practice medicine again would add a psychological torment to the physical pain.

The only question was if he was doing this to appease the Council or because he genuinely believed the possibility that Kothe had flipped Cipher. If the former, he would leave her medical skills intact because they were important to her. If the latter, the addition of Doctor Lokin meant he could take being a doctor from her without compromising the team’s effectiveness – and he wouldn’t hesitate.

The Minister pulled off his jacket and draped it backwards over her like a blanket. The shadowsilk lining was soft against her forearms.

“I cannot move you from here safely,” the Minister said gently. “Please do not go into shock.” He reached up and pulled the gag from her mouth.

Another head-game.

“Why are you doing this to me?” Cipher couldn’t keep her voice steady.

“The way I spoke to you in Keeper’s office was to make certain you would fail your psych eval. I should have hit you harder: been overtly cruel instead of dismissive, made you work to convince me and made it clear you had not. Fixer Ninety-eight very nearly decided you were mentally sound. But I could not be certain how far into your IX treatment you were. I didn’t want to risk actually damaging your mind.” The Minister petted Cipher’s hair as he spoke. “The kidnapping is so that when whichever Dark Councilor has the same idea tries, the security footage will indicate someone else got there first. There are no monitoring devices down here, no guards.”

The hair-petting felt nice. It was pathetic, but it did. It always had. Cipher leaned into his hands.

No torture today. Not from the Minister, not from the Sith.

No execution for treason, either.

Good day. Nice day. Pretty day.

“I think you hit me just hard enough,” Cipher said softly.

Keeper huffed air out his nose, his eyes crinkling at the corners. It was his version of laughter. She hadn’t seen that in—in a long time.

“I suppose you would,” he said. “And you did fail, no harm done. How long?”

“Twenty-two days,” Cipher replied. She had leaned forward. The Minister stopped long enough to flip the jacket around and drape it over her shoulders. Then he went right back to petting, adding gentle, massaging strokes.

“The final week is the worst. You should leave piloting the ship to the others.”

“The—the records said repeated use is ‘inhibiting.’” Cipher said in a near-whisper. “Will the headaches stop like they did before?”

The Minister’s eyes crinkled.

“The side effect of a second dose is ocular nerve degeneration,” he said. “You haven’t had those for a long time.”

Dual-optic cybernetic replacement was a difficult adjustment even for a pre-pubescent brain. For an adult, the physical therapy alone could take up to two years. Fifteen percent of adult patients never fully adapted. It certainly was an “inhibiting” side-effect, well worth the severity of the holo-doctor’s warning-- but not for Cipher. She could free herself with impunity.

Son of a schutta. Clever man.

“You—tricked the Dark Council, and they’re scared of _me_ defying them.”

“I don’t lock Dark Councilors in force-field cages and shoot them.” The Minister lightly rapped her on the nose with one finger. “Not that I disagree with your decision, but you do see how one they notice and one they do not.”

Cipher smiled ruefully. There was that.

There was one last question.

“‘Your wife says the position suits you?’”

“Ah,” the Minister said primly. He urged Cipher to lay on the bed with gentle touches. He took the blanket folded at the foot of the mattress and draped it over her legs and freezing feet as he spoke. “You were so affectionate after—Zash’s, ah, gift, that I rather thought you might—I did not want the thought of reciprocation to steady you or to give you any hope at all.” The Minister sat at the head of the bed and resumed his ministrations. The massage was taking the edge off the headache in a way the painkillers hadn’t.

Cipher moved, resting her cheek on the cortosis armor-panel on his thigh. She rested her hands against his kneecap.

“I mean, do you have one?” Cipher said. It was easier this way, looking at the wall, rather than looking him in the eye.

“Oh. Yes.”

So, she was just a mistress. Given his age and rank it shouldn’t be a surprise. He had never indicated any feelings to the contrary, and she’d never imagined a family of any kind as part of her future-- but still. It stung. Cipher breathed out, long and slow.

“I married Marielle when I was in the Navy,” the Minister said softly. Cipher startled. She hadn’t been expecting a name. “When I entered Intelligence and realized keeping my vows would no longer be possible, I offered her a choice: I could back out of the transfer and accept the prison sentence instead--”

Cipher twisted her head to look up at the Minister. “Prison sentence” did not sound like the man she knew.

“Apart from you, I do not play well with others, and I do not take kindly to micromanagement. Fine traits in an operative, unforgiveable in a soldier.”

That did sound like the man she knew. His spacer cover identities got damned mouthy, it had to come from somewhere.

“Marielle is Chiss,” the Minister continued. “The dishonor of a husband in prison was an unbearable prospect, so we simply removed fidelity as a component of our relationship. Marielle takes great pains not to see what I am now capable of, or what I do. You know exactly who I am because I have either done those things with you or to you.”

The position of Minister didn’t suit him nearly so much as it suited who Marielle chose to believe him to be.

“If this ends badly for me,” the Minister continued haltingly, “if you would not mind—checking in on her? From time to time?”

If things went sideways – and the Minister believed they were going to go sideways for him or he wouldn’t be asking – someone like Marielle would be defenseless. Politics were one thing, assassins were another.

“Of course,” Cipher whispered. “If I haven’t gone down with you.” She would not pretend she had any intention of saving Marielle’s life over his.

“I have no plans in that direction,” the Minister said simply.

One of the legacies of living on the streets was the knowledge that the future was fleeting and its existence was by no means guaranteed. It was a lesson being an operative had only reinforced.

In the rush to warm and calm her, the Minister had forgotten to remove her cuffs, so getting up was more of a challenge that it otherwise would have been. Cipher managed to get up on her knees and rest her palms on either side of his face. His five o’clock shadow was rough against her palms. The blue-gray of his eyes contrasted sharply with his dark brows in the half-light. His thin white shirt highlighted his chest and shoulders. The chill in the room had tightened his nipples.

Cipher pressed her mouth to his. His lips were still dry, that hadn’t changed. Neither did the way the gentle touch of his mouth warmed her body.

“Cipher,” he protested when she released him. “This is hardly the time or place.”

“You just told me you’re worried about being executed. In the morning, you’re sending me after a highly-skilled operative for a mysterious and powerful shadow organization – an operative who also wants to make me his sex slave. We’re completely alone in a room with no cameras and a bed. Can you possibly think of a better time?”   

“I rather take your point.” The Minister ran his hands up her forearms. He gently toyed with the cuffs with his thumbs. “On or off?”

Cipher knew she wore her bracers much more snugly-laced than most fighters. When the Minister pushed lightly on the cuffs, the pressure was the same… but decidedly more stimulating.

“On, to start. If we don’t like it, we can always change our minds.”

~*~

The cell’s mattress was like sleeping on a heap of dirty laundry and the blanket was rough. Cipher didn’t care. She was pressed skin-to-skin with the Minister, warm and relatively safe, and for the first time in a month her headache was gone. It would come back. Two orgasms and a scalp massage wouldn’t last long. But for the moment, she was feeling no pain.

This time the Minister was the one on his back playing human pillow with Cipher curled up to fit. His eyes were focused just beyond the stone ceiling.

“So it’s to be more mission-related pillow talk, I see,” Cipher said dryly.

“I do my best thinking after sex,” the Minister said.

Cipher smiled to herself, picturing Marielle always knowing when there was a thorny problem at Intelligence because the Minister wouldn’t leave her alone. It was tempting to make a joke about offering her own services if Marielle ever wanted a break, but— he was thinking.

He was most himself when he was with Cipher. It was petty to feel like she’d won a contest, but Cipher did feel the victor. She could afford to be gracious. Especially since if the Minister had never gotten himself courts-martialed in the Navy, Marielle would be married to the medical officer she’d married instead of being married to the seasoned spy she was now.

There were no happy endings for agents, the Minister had said when he’d retired Cipher from being an asset. No happy endings for those who loved them, either, it seemed.

“Tell your team everything,” the Minister said finally. “They’ve proven themselves trustworthy, and each of them brings a sensibility that is rare in the Intelligence world. It would be foolish not to make full use of those resources just because they do not fit the human ideal.”

Oh, Force. Kaliyo and Vector were going to go fusion, for different reasons.

“I will read Keeper in, as well,” the Minister continued. “Only the seven of us will have the full picture. Since you have failed your evaluation you will be put on restricted duty. My current secretary is a Sith plant. He pawns off any courier duties to continue to keep an eye on me, which means I can have you assigned as my courier without any trouble or attracting undue notice. Officially you will be picking up and delivering dispatches too sensitive for comm channels, and whatever else I require.”

Being the Minister’s personal courier would give her a legitimate reason to be almost anywhere she needed to be. The other stops would mask her trail, making it harder for their conspirator prey to tell she was closing in on them.

“Understood, sir,” Cipher agreed.

“Though I do not share his malevolence, I do understand Hunter’s need for control. Your Castellan restraints gave him complete control over another human being, even against your own will. Like a spice addict, he will do anything to recapture that feeling. Even knowing how dangerous to his mission contacting you is, he will not be able to help himself. Do not flirt with him. The forcing of his attentions on you is what makes it fun.”

Cipher swallowed.

“Yes, sir.”

“You are authorized for deadly force if you need to protect yourself.”

That, at least, was a relief.

“Am I to return Doctor Lokin to the Wastes?” Cipher asked.

“Not necessary. He alienated the last Minister, not me. If Lokin is amenable to continuing with you, then he may stay. He is a fine agent. However, don’t let him inject you with anything you cannot identify. Be aware: he knew of you as Thirteen. If you did not give that information to Vector, he did, for unknown reasons.”

Son of a schutta.

“I will find out why.” _And talk Vector down, if necessary_ , she did not say. People sometimes got touchy about children in combat.

The Minister snorted.

“There was a reason I took such pains with your post-retirement alias. We will see if Lokin will make two-for-two with alienating a Minister.”

“He probably told the story without specifics and assumed Vector would be too stupid to put the pieces together,” Cipher said, letting her irritation color her voice. “It’s been… a recurring theme with Vector. Useful. Frustrating.”

The Minister snorted.

“I need to sedate you now, so that you have the drugs in your system should a test be run,” the Minister said. “My ‘Sith guards’ will return you to the medbay.”

Cipher pushed the blanket away and reached for her sleepwear. The Minister began dressing as well.

He kissed her on the mouth before administering the dose.


	12. Cipher Nine and the Minister: Isen IV

Cipher gathered her team around the intercom before they departed Dromund Kaas. There were kaal moths fluttering in her stomach, and she kept her hands folded on the table to keep them steady.

“The good news--” Cipher began, but the speech she’d rehearsed in the medbay awaiting her release sounded hollow when said aloud. “We’ve—I’ve—I failed my psychological evaluation. I’m on what the military calls ‘light duty.’ If any of you want a more regular wartime assignment, I won’t make you stay.”

“They should have relieved you of duty for a least a month,” Lokin said clinically.

“I have ‘great psychological resilience,’” Cipher said. “I’ve been reassigned as the Minister’s personal courier. We’ll be protecting and delivering dispatches too sensitive for comm channels, as well as whatever else the Minister requires.”

“Would not a better use of our abilities be chasing Hunter?” Vector said.

Cipher nodded.

“That is one of the things the Minister requires. There’s something else. I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you before, but it was classified and the Minister only just cleared you to know. Lokin and Riana, you weren’t here for this,” Cipher summarized the events of Eradication Day for them, and then continued, “Jadus was badly wounded. It is entirely possible that he escaped his ship only to die of his wounds.”

“Good for you,” Kaliyo said, over the top of Raina’s curse of disbelief.

“The Council was… concerned. Both that I thought I could take on a Councilor in a fight and that I was willing to do so, much less that Keeper and I hurt him so badly. Keeper is a eugenics creation but I--” Cipher took a deep breath. “It was accept programming so that I would have an off switch similar to Keeper’s, or execution.”

It was a lie: she was implying the Minister had asked her permission when he had not. But she had agreed with his reasoning after the fact and would have consented if asked, which was close enough for Cipher. It wouldn’t be equivalent for anyone at the table but Lokin, who was also an agent. He knew the life.

“Hunter somehow got hold of my keyword and gave it to Kothe,” Cipher continued. “Who used it.”

Cipher’s hands were shaking even though they were clasped on the table. Her heart was racing. Being used as a puppet against the Empire was harder to talk about here, with people she cared about, then being interrogated by Fixer Ninety-eight. The look of pity in their eyes made what Kothe had done more real.

“So, you agreed to let them brainwash you as a punishment for saving their asses,” Kaliyo said furiously. “Then you kept working for them? And then you’re going to lecture _me_ about ‘the Empire giving me protection and a job?’ What in the Force is wrong with you?”

“It was only a safeguard against an action I was never going to take. A non-issue,” Cipher replied. “Only the Minister and the Council even knew about it. Or were supposed to know.”

“See, you say that like it’s helping,” Kaliyo mocked. “These are people like Jadus and Zhorrid and you just handed them the keys to your body and hoped they didn’t take it out for a fly. What if they’d ordered you to kill one of us?”

“It was that or be summarily executed as a potential threat,” Cipher said.

“Would’ve have been better than this!” Kaliyo shouted.

“Not for me!” Cipher fired back. The rest of her team was staring. She took deep breaths. Ice, ice, ice.

“Did you at least have a plan?”

“No,” Cipher said. “The point of the Castellan restraints was an off-switch I couldn’t disobey. I was only able to break Kothe’s control by re-administering the brainwashing and choosing my own keyword.”

“And if the Council finds out they’ll kill you,” Kaliyo argued. “But you’re going to be the Minister’s good little kath hound and go fetch his slippers anyway. You really disgust me sometimes, Agent Blade.”

The scorn in Kaliyo’s voice wasn’t a surprise. It was still hard to take.

“Don’t be so hard on Cipher, Kaliyo,” Lokin interrupted gently. “It’s not anything she can help. Besides, the Minister obviously briefed her on how to fight it if the restraints were ever abused. Kaas City would be a smoking crater if he hadn’t.”

“I thought the point was an off switch that couldn’t be ignored.” Kaliyo’s voice was scathing. “Don’t pour piss in my glass and tell me it’s juma.”

“As a single-command off switch, absolutely,” Lokin said. “Most people think of mind control the way they portray it in the holo-vids. But those of us in fringe science know that there are natural laws and natural law-keepers. Active mind-control, especially over the long-term, is a tricky thing. The choice of mission and subject has to be undertaken with the greatest care.”

Lokin’s confirmation was good to hear. The Minister hadn’t gambled her self-determination on a gut feeling, but actual science. Fringe science, true, but science nonetheless.

“I don’t understand,” Raina said. She looked ashen. Cipher couldn’t help but wonder if she would still want to be tutored in spy-work after this.

“I don’t enjoy killing,” Cipher elaborated. “I only do it when I don’t have any other options. So using mind control to stop me from killing a Dark Council member, no matter how much I wanted to kill him in that moment? Guaranteed to work. I’m loyal to the Empire, so mind-control to stop me from defying the ruling council of that Empire – even if I had a very good reason for defiance at the time -- would also have been easy.”

“When you chose a subject unsuited to the mission for mind control, they are either able to find a way to shake the mind-control entirely as Cipher did or commit suicide rather than obey,” Lokin finished.

“So, Hunter could not have used your programming to…” Vector said, making a vague hand gesture.

“A spy sleeps with people they don’t desire as a matter of course,” Lokin said. “That very easily could have worked. As I said: a tricky thing.”

“That doesn’t change anything. You handed the Empire complete control, it almost got you killed, and you’re still working for them,” Kaliyo spat. “That’s _sick_.”

“It’s the job,” Cipher said slowly, to Raina as much as Kaliyo. “I told you when I was given my Basic designation: when you sign on for this job you don’t belong to yourself anymore. You are and you do whatever is necessary. The Dark Council couldn’t stop Jadus, I did, and these are the consequences. We leave for Isen IV in an hour. If anyone wants to get off, I will file the appropriate paperwork.”

Cipher left the table and went to the medbay. Lokin kept the biochemical samples, compounds, and medical supplies well organized. Drawing up a requisition would at least keep her busy.

She didn’t want any of them to leave.

Not everyone was cut out for Intelligence. People washed out of the Academy, or Intelligence, every day. Or they let the darkness they walked in twist them into something cruel and selfish.

“Agent?” Vector asked. “May we have a moment?”

“Of course,” Cipher said.

“In the old days as a diplomat, we could read people. Since our Joining, that has become harder, so we must be direct. Is our relationship becoming unprofessional?” he asked quietly.

She could lie. She could lie to him just as she had lied for the Minister, and Vector would stay. Vector’s wisdom and diplomatic skills were essential, and with Kaliyo leaving, Cipher would have only a rakghoul for combat support if Vector left as well. It wouldn’t be hard to convince herself it was necessary. It was certainly what Lokin would do in her place.

“I don’t understand the question,” Cipher hedged.

“What are we to you? Are we simply an asset, or something else?”

Cipher couldn’t do it. A rakghoul would have to suffice.

“I care for you a great deal,” she said, looking down at the desk. “That’s all I can say.”

“We care for you as well,” Vector said softly. “Though you are not Joined, we consider you as part of our nest. We will defend our nest, and we will defend you.”

Vector was going to stay. No manipulation, no lies, and he was going to stay. Cipher’s throat was tight and there was a hiccupy gasp waiting in her stomach.

“That’s the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me.” Her voice was pitching and yawing between high notes and low.

“Doctor Lokin told us a story of a Cipher agent and his young asset,” Vector said, “to show us Keeper’s behavior was wrong. We do not think he realized we would recognize the story was of you and the Minister. But we think—We think that you should know that we know.”

Cipher took a deep breath, then another.

“During the meeting, by saying I couldn’t help it--” she explained. “Lokin thinks the Minister indoctrinated me as a child. Changing someone’s name, cutting them off from other ties: those are means of emotional control. That’s not how it happened with us. The others will probably see it Lokin’s way. I would appreciate discretion.”

“We know the alones would see it so. But we are Killik. Fingerlings defend the nest with all the fervor of full mantids. When nests war, the surviving young meld into the dominant nest as if hatched there. It is The Way,” Vector said firmly. “Perhaps that is why you understand the hive so well when other alones do not.”

Cipher smiled despite herself. Maybe it was.

The Minister had known about what had happened with Kothe before she’d briefed him. That could have been his considerable skill as a spy. But knowing Vector had known about her time as Thirteen when Vector was clearly smart enough to be discreet?

“Thank you for calling the Minister,” Cipher said, her voice fluting again. “The erratic behavior during the mission, I hoped—I know people, even people on this team, treat you like you’re less intelligent just because you’re Joined. I was counting on you to notice something was wrong and contact my handler. You did. Thank you. You saved my life.”

Vector didn’t say anything right away.

“We are pleased that you depended on us,” Vector finally replied. His voice was thick with what wasn’t said. When he placed a hand on Cipher’s shoulder, Cipher reached up and covered it with her own.

~*~

They all stayed. Doctor Lokin because he had survived this long by picking winning partners and he saw Cipher as a winner; Raina because she was shaken but not dissuaded; and Kaliyo because she wanted to be there when Cipher “woke up and smelled the thermite.”

They set course for Isen IV.

Isen was a slaughterhouse. If there was a Great Hunt for being a sick freak, Hunter would certainly win Grand Champion.

Watcher Three wanted to eliminate the witnesses. He was a good kid, but still a kid: a silent colony would be chalked up to Imperial slaughter without question. If she saved the colonists, some of them would have the moral courage to tell the truth about who had saved them (the Imperial agent) and who had put them in danger (the SIS operative she was chasing).

“Your reputation may be secure, but mine isn’t,” Watcher Three stated. “Still, I will back you whatever you decide.”

The implication in Three’s statement was clear and inevitable. The Minister had to have walked right through the dewback-pen to get to Keeper’s office. That meeting followed by Cipher’s charges being dismissed followed by assignment as the Minister’s courier?

Watcher Three wasn’t stupid.

From anyone else it would have been an expression of professional jealousy or even contempt, but Three wasn’t the type. He was simply stating the truth: Cipher had the Minister’s protection and Three did not.

“I’ll be careful,” Cipher promised.

~*~

They made two drops and a pickup on their way back to Dromund Kaas.

Lokin received notice two of his safehouses had been compromised and one destroyed. Lokin seemed confident an old enemy was behind the attack, not the conspirators he was chasing with Cipher.

She and Vector received a disappointment of their own: their proposal for a Killik-Empire alliance had been rejected. Vector thought the fault was his. He was twice compromised, no longer human and no longer a diplomat. Cipher was of the opinion the Diplomatic Service was just too short-sighted to see the benefits of the Killik as a species. Still, Falner Oeth had offered his backing in exchange for a few unspecified favors, which was something.

Oeth seemed slimy enough that it shouldn’t be hard for Cipher to find something in his past that could be used for blackmail. Just in case he opted not to live up to his end of the bargain with Vector.

Kallin was walking down the hallway leading away from Keeper’s office when Cipher and Vector arrived.

“Mr. Kallin,” Vector said politely. “Good to see you again.”

“Cipher Nine. Mr… Hyllus? I wasn’t told you would be at the meeting, so I didn’t bring cups for you. Forgive me?”

He’d only met each of them once, and he was greeting them with supercilious-and-officious for “frell you, schutta.” Someone was very cranky about not being able to hang onto his target today.

“Don’t worry, Kallin,” Cipher said brightly. “We’re just dropping a few things off and heading on our way. But thank you for thinking of us.”

The Minister was watching the Republic Chancellor make his announcement of war.

“Display off,” the Minister said. Remote started broadcasting in the corner. “Tell me, Cipher, what is your assessment of your mission at Isen IV?”

“We identified Hunter’s role in the clandestine operation, even if its purpose is not yet clear. We also captured evidence.” Cipher held out her missives as she spoke, and the Minister took them without comment.

“Yes, that evidence: the device used to sabotage the colony. Fixer Twelve recognized the override technology from Operation Starbender, eight years ago. That mission was also an anomaly.”

Keeper entered her office.

“How are the new Watchers working out?” the Minister asked.

“Their brains are faster than mine, sir,” Keeper reported, “and they don’t need as much sleep. This generation seems promising.”

“How long since you’ve been off-duty?” Cipher asked gently. Keeper was pale, and there were dark circles under her eyes.

“Forty-seven hours. We’ve been busy,” Keeper said.

“Tell her about Starbender,” the Minister prompted.

“Starbender was a disaster, or it should have been. A pirate fleet was about to destroy an Imperial base… when the pirates’ flagship exploded. It was sabotaged by unknown persons. We were saved using the same technology that destroyed Isen IV. Realizing that, I reviewed other ‘lucky incidents’ – Operations Morning Crest and Vanity – looking for other occurrences of this technology.”

“That’s when you found the recording?” the Minister asked.

“Yes,” Keeper said, “caught four years ago, simultaneous with Morning Crest.” Keeper approached a console and typed. After a second--

“I am inside the SIS,” Hunter’s voice said.

“Maintain cover for six months, then proceed. Guard your thoughts when near the Jedi,” a different voice said. Hunter’s boss. Well, well.

“Understood,” Hunter replied. The recording went silent.

“These people have been intervening in our affairs. I assume you recognize the voice?” the Minister asked.

“I recognize the servant,” Cipher confirmed, “but not the master.”

“Yes, go on,” the Minister told Keeper. His voice was gentle and even: the Minister was in a good mood today.

“At the minister’s suggestion, the Watchers and I began searching old case files for patterns of outside intervention. We’ve found sixty-two relevant incidents so far. The oldest go back centuries – before the Empire revealed itself to the galaxy. But nine are from the past five years.”

Busy was an understatement.

“Who do you deem responsible?”

“In my analysis…” Keeper stated, “An organization with espionage training and considerable resources, unaffiliated with either the Republic or the Empire, motivations unknown.”

“You must have some guess as to who they are, what they’re after?” Cipher asked.

“We are working on it, the pieces just aren’t there.”

“Who benefits?” was one of the primary questions asked during an investigation. Not only could it narrow down a list of suspects, it also enabled you to get out ahead of your target. Keeper had given Cipher a great deal of intel to process, but not the piece she needed most.  

“With the republic at our doorstep, now is not the time to be chasing conspiracies or ghosts,” the Minister admitted. “But we have little choice. Someone is manipulating this war. Someone who destroyed the Shadow Arsenal and Isen Four. Who gave the SIS your keyword. I need you to find these invisible agents before they do something catastrophic.”

Hunter had been willing to destroy all of Kaas City to start this war. He had nearly eliminated all of Isen IV when that had failed.  

“I’ll expose these people, and I’ll learn the truth,” Cipher promised. They had captured General Verzau from the heart of Coruscant during the last war, and a hundred other successes. Between her partner and her team – this conspiracy’s days were ticking away even if they didn’t know it yet.

“We’ve identified thirteen possible leads on the enemy, all off world. We’ll narrow those down by the time you reach your ship,” Keeper promised.

“Good,” the Minister stated. “Get an hour’s rest, then return to work.”

Keeper nodded, then left. The Minister turned to Cipher.

“I have a meeting with Darth Baras and the Minister of War. I will keep this operation secret for as long as possible, but eventually our foes will discover us.”

Even a chaste touch would be indiscreet in Vector’s presence, and inappropriate in Keeper’s office. Cipher settled for bringing herself to attention and trusting he knew her well enough to know what she wanted to say.

“Yes, sir.”

~*~

Kaliyo was skeptical of their chances when the Watcher sent them to Belsavis.

“We work together as a team, and we don’t lose sight of our goals,” Cipher said. “These people are used to going up against the Empire and Republic’s poster-children: soldiers, Academy-trained agents, eugenics creations, Jedi. None of us fit those molds.” A Rattataki anarchist, a Killik, a mad scientist who had turned himself into a half-rakghoul, a force-sensitive human who had been adopted Chiss, and Thirteen. “They are not going to know what to do with us.”

Vector nodded. Lokin smiled. Raina stood up taller.

“All right, all right,” Kaliyo said, waving her hand. “Strap in. Let’s go.”

~*~  


	13. Cipher Nine and the Minister: Belsavis

Raina had the helm – Cipher wouldn’t be cleared to fly for another three days – when she asked Cipher about seduction.

“I’ve dated a lot of the wrong guys, but I always thought there was at least a chance it could work out. How do you form that connection knowing you have to walk away or don’t really mean it?”

“Lust is a weapon,” Cipher stated simply. “You use it as such.”

“That’s horrible! Next, you’re going to tell me my parents’ marriage was a sham, two Cipher agents living under one roof.”

Cipher’s lips thinned. Raina had told her that her parents had bought her the best sheltering money could buy. They had done her no favors in doing so.

“Not necessarily. Intelligence may have even encouraged the partnership.”

“Well,” Raina said, asperity in her voice. “Thank you for your honesty, Agent.” She was looking pointedly at the controls.

Cipher sighed silently. From what she remembered, the Minister’s lessons had always seemed to fit seamlessly into what Cipher knew of the world. Logical. Easy to swallow, if hard to apply. Cipher had hoped it would be the same with Raina, but she was proving a difficult student. Or perhaps Cipher wasn’t that good a teacher.

“What I can tell you… What you’re talking about and what I’m talking about: it’s dewbacks and banthas,” Cipher said. “‘Connection’ just isn’t there when you’re seducing someone for work. Not for you, anyway. It can’t be, not without you giving them as much chance to manipulate you as you are manipulating them. That doesn’t mean that you _can’t_ have connection with someone outside of work. But if you do decide to take a lover —fidelity is not something you can give. You either lie about it or come to an agreement. Or you have friends to…” Cipher mimicked the vague gesture Vector had used during the briefing “…scratch the itch with.”

“Is it—wouldn’t it be hard to keep it straight? I mean if you’re acting in love and he’s bringing you starlillies and telling you how wonderful you are, wouldn’t you start to feel… something?”

Raina asked the question like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

The possibility had never once occurred to Cipher. In all her time as Thirteen, she had never heard the Minister speak of his marks with genuine affection.

“Not for me, nor my mentor.”

Raina didn’t reply, but her face clearly conveyed what she thought of Cipher.

~*~

Oeth called for this first real favor: he wanted a Republic governor Joined so that Vector could go rooting through his head. It was a brilliant plan, Cipher couldn’t blame Oeth for asking.

“We thought he wanted us for our diplomatic skills, not for this. Joining should be a gift.” There was real pain in his voice.

Cipher’s conversation with Raina pricked her conscience. As a spy, she should tell Vector to grit his teeth and do what needed to be done. But Joining—It wasn’t like sex. It was more like the connection Raina had spoken of.

Cipher wasn’t certain she was capable of that strong an emotion. But if someone asked her to manipulate how much Vector cared for her into something else, or to try to wheedle information she wasn’t entitled to from the Minister…

“This is wrong, Vector, and you know it. Find another way.”

“We will do as we must,” Vector said. “We will return as soon as we can.”

“Take your time,” Cipher said. What didn’t ally with the Empire got squashed, and she didn’t want the Killik getting squashed. “Belsavis is a prison. A jailbreak should make Kaliyo happy.”

~*~

Belsavis was a win from beginning to end. Getting attacked by Pashton Cortess afterward, not so much.

“Losing anonymity is dangerous thing,” Lokin said afterward as he pulled on his clothes. “I knew an agent who lost his anonymity at his daughter’s wedding. A holocam caught him by accident. He was dead three days later. We counted forty-eight suspects.”

Hunter was recruiting her enemies. It wasn’t a surprise.

“Backing down isn’t an option,” Cipher replied, patting him on the shoulder. She could see Pashton being loaded into a security vehicle through the duraglass. “We’ll just have to deal with what comes as it comes. Besides, I wasn’t expecting a quiet retirement at the end of my career, anyway.”

~*~

Vector met back up with the team on Dromund Kaas. He had sweet-talked the governor into playing nice with Diplomatic Services. It was enough for Oeth to live up to his end of the bargain.

“It’s like talking to a bug in a man’s skin. How can you stand it?” Oeth asked Cipher after Vector had left the room to peruse the list of individuals he and Oeth would be meeting with.

“Vector,” Cipher corrected him sharply, “is a brave man and a loyal Imperial.”

“You can’t be serious. The Killik are an abomination. They are an anathema to everything the Empire stands for. There is no place for ‘great men’ in the hive mind, only animal instinct. I’ll be relieved when you two finish with this scheme and eliminate the Colony for good.” Oeth’s voice and bearing dripped with his disgust. The holo faded.

She notified Vector of Oeth’s true feelings for the Killik immediately. He wasn’t surprised. He had already planned to drop Oeth as no longer useful, but Vector promised to keep an eye on him just in case. Cipher couldn’t help but be proud of him for that.

~*~

The Phantom had to be fueled up and preventative maintenance run before Cipher would be able to pursue the lead they’d garnered from SCORPIO. Vector was using the time to meet with Oeth’s people. Cipher swung by the Minister’s office.

“Here’s the set,” she said, handing Kallin the missives she’d picked up on the way home to Dromund Kaas. On impulse, Cipher tilted her head. Kallin’s desk was almost on a line of sight to the Minister’s—

“The Minister isn’t in,” Kallin said officiously. “You can give whatever message you have to me, and I will see it relayed.”

“No message,” Cipher replied. Her stomach fluttered guiltily. Kallin’s desk screen had the Minister’s agenda pulled up. The name listed for the hour was Mandalorian. “The next list of pickups?”

“Here,” Kallin said, handing the information over. “On your way.”

Cipher saluted and departed.

Outside was baking hot and dripping humid, a typical Dromund Kaas summer. The falnir flowers would be blooming any day now. The bloody weeds should have been eliminated, but the Sith harvested the blooms to make an aphrodisiac they used during their parties. Therefore, the rest of the city’s populace simply had to endure spending a full week out of the year restless, on edge, and given to fits of either lust or anger.

Cipher was glad she was going to be off-world this year. She and the Minister both were part of the latter group. Now that they were… whatever they were… it probably wouldn’t be a good combination.

The Intelligence speeder terminal had a line of agents waiting, so Cipher opted to take a right onto the skyway. The view of the city was as breathtaking as always, even in the heat. The railing was too hot to touch, so Cipher kept the shaded area closest to the buildings. She paused in front of the Sith Sanctum to enjoy the ever-present chill in the air, then continued when the Pureblood guard gave her a steady look.

It was pathetic and unprofessional. She absolutely shouldn’t. She should just turn left and head straight to the Mandalorian speeder terminal.

Cipher paused for just a moment, looking inside at the lobby—

She met the Minister’s blue-gray eyes. Caught. The Minister finished speaking with the Mandalorian next to him and exchanged bows.

It was too late to flee now, so Cipher waited while the Minister exited. He was carrying a slim pad computer.

“Cipher,” he said simply. Cipher fell in next to him, a half-step behind as protocol dictated. “What are you doing here?”

“The Phantom is stuck at the spaceport. I fancied a walk.” Cipher spoke in her most confident voice.

“Ah.” The Minister’s voice was amused. “In thirty-three-degree heat with 95% humidity.” The Minister hadn’t been outside but a moment and sweat was already standing out on his crown and the back of his neck. She could feel hers trickling down her temples.

“I won’t do it again, sir,” Cipher promised.

“I don’t mind,” the Minister said gently. He nodded at the Pureblood guard as they passed, then turned inside the Sanctum. Cipher hadn’t been dismissed, so she followed. She was his courier, after all.

“I received a lovely note from the Dread Masters commending me for sending such a fine agent to their aid. You have impressed them, and the Emperor as well. The Diplomatic Service is having kath pups with Prince Shange and those Republic researchers you found.”

“The Republic talks a fine game, but scratch the surface and their take on non-human life is no different than ours. At least a slave who knows she’s a slave can earn her freedom.” The new Lord Kallig was one such slave, who had adhered to the chain of command (such as it was for Sith) and with hard work and ambition climbed the ranks. If one could ever be said to want to meet a Sith, Cipher wanted to meet her someday.

The Minister opened a door partway down a long hallway, and Cipher stepped inside. The Minister closed the door.

“This is a cleaning services closet.” There was barely enough room to stand in between the carts and boxes of supplies, and the harsh smell of sanitizer filled the little room.

“Given their proclivities, Sith are not likely to mind,” the Minister said.

_Mind what?_ But before she could ask the question, the Minister placed a gloved hand on the back of her neck and—

Oh.

Cipher gripped his upper arms with both hands. What a pleasant surprise.

“I _needed_ a solid victory to give the Council,” the Minister murmured when he released her mouth. He did not let go his hold on the back of her neck. “You gave me three.”

“Just… doing my job.”

“You do not disappoint,” the Minister said. He touched his lips to Cipher's cheek, then used some of the sani-paper to wipe the traces of her lipstick from his mouth. “I have to go. We’ll talk again when I can.” He left the closet.

Cipher waited until she could force the smile from her lips. She carefully wiped her cheek in case of transfer, and around her mouth to eliminate any smudging. Then she saw herself out of the Sanctum.

~*~

The message they recovered from Tytun IV was valuable, as valuable as the intel they recovered from the Megasecurity Ward on Beslavis. It came with a terrible cost: Keeper and four of the new Watchers, all on life support.

Their saving grace was that Keeper herself was relatively new. Watcher Three had been her right-hand man during the transition, and most agents would still be comfortable enough with the Minister he could share Keeper’s duties with Watcher Three if need be. There were two Watchers in retirement due to physical handicaps severe enough to remove them from fieldwork. Lokin had been tasked with delivering the news they had been summarily returned to active duty, no refusals.

If Lokin had any Watcher training, they probably would have kept him, too.

Their only lead was a meeting set up in a Voss teahouse by Keeper. Watcher Three dispatched Cipher immediately.

Hunter called as soon as she reached the Phantom.

“Cipher. Hope you don’t mind me checking in. You weren’t expecting any other calls?”

“Get to the point, Hunter,” Cipher said, deliberately not taking the bait.

“Your visit to Megasecurity Ward 23 left it in bad shape… Now do I come into your house and break your things?” Hunter’s voice was patronizing, just as when he’d promised to remove her anonymity.

There was nothing in her Dromund Kaas apartment she couldn’t afford to lose, but that wasn’t why Hunter was implying he knew where she lived.

“But you finding that holotrap, frying your Keeper’s synapses—that’s kind of cosmic justice.”

Hunter shouldn’t have called. Non-local interaction – knowing what was happening in real time in a secondary location – could only happen if there was an agent on-site or a bug. Intelligence HQ was for bugs multiple times a day. There were no more than fifty Intelligence personnel who knew about Keeper’s collapse. It would narrow their suspect pool for the Star Cabal’s plant considerably.

“You’re talking nonsense,” Cipher said blandly. “There’s been no holotrap. Keeper is fine.”

“Cipher,” Hunter chided. “It’s been fun: playing tag, brainwashing you – remember your keyword?” Onomatophobia, the fear of a word. She did remember. “But you keep coming, and we’ll destroy your world. No friends, no allies, no Empire left to fight for. Are you ready for that?”

Killing Cipher’s friends and allies was well within Hunter’s power. Life in the Empire’s service was a ticking countdown, they knew that as well as she. But Hunter was bluffing more than he was threatening: “no Empire to fight for” would mean there would have to be no Emperor. Cipher had just returned the Dread Masters to his service, and whoever these Star Cabal people were… they simply were not the equal to the immortal Emperor. Especially if the Emperor was truly was Revan the Butcher as the Revanites suspected.

Hunter wanted Cipher scared. From the holotrap call, Cipher knew the Star Cabal was worried that they’d over-reached themselves with their plan. Cipher and her team were unstable elements in a volatile situation.

“We’ll see,” Cipher said. She disconnected the holocall.

Hunter wouldn’t be able to stomach Cipher’s defiance. He was going to do something awful to punish Cipher for it, true, but he when he called to gloat about it afterwards... Hopefully he would let slip something else useful.


	14. Cipher Nine and the Minister: Voss

Their ETA on Voss was four days away when Cipher woke the entire ship due to a vivid nightmare of Hunter fully exploring her keyword.

“I’m not fine, but I’m functional,” Cipher promised, holding her head in her hands. She was trembling. Her bedsheets were ruined, soaked in sweat.

“The minute it is possible,” Lokin said firmly, “you need to take medical leave: months, not weeks. If I thought the Minister would listen I would order it immediately.”

Twovee shuffled in, holding a glass of water on a tray. Cipher took it without protest.

“We’re short-staffed as it is. I’ll make it.” She drained the water and pushed herself out of bed. Her pajamas were just as ruined as the sheets. “I need to change.”

“Like I said, Agent. Sick.” Kaliyo pushed off from the wall and headed to her own bunk. It was possible Kaliyo’s anarchist tendencies were behind her fury at Cipher’s brainwashing, but it was nice to believe it was fondness. She _had_ stayed with Cipher longer than any of her exes.

“Perhaps a mild sedative?” Lokin offered.

“I don’t want to sleep anymore tonight,” Cipher said softly. “And I was set to relieve Raina at the helm in a little while anyway.”

“You will take a midday rest tomorrow.” Lokin wasn’t asking. Cipher nodded.

She had one membrosia orb left. After stripping her bed, using the fresher, and changing into her uniform, Cipher took the orb to the mess. She warmed the membrosia and added a little nutmeg. Then she headed to the bridge.

“That was some nightmare,” Raina said. “I heard it from here. Are you all right?”

“No,” Cipher said. “Hazard of the work. I’m not going to sleep again tonight. Take off early.” Raina nodded. She handed over the helm with crisp, professional movements.

Cipher watched hyperspace slide by the viewscreen, sipping her bug milk.

_It didn’t really happen_ , she told herself. _It won’t._

Her personal holo went off, not the ship’s. Part of her was afraid it was Hunter and didn’t want to answer.

Rankled by her own cowardice, Cipher flipped the switch.

“Minister!” Cipher said. She moved to set down her membrosia and stand at attention, but the Minister waved his hand dismissively. Cipher curled back up in the pilot’s seat. “What can I do for you?”

“If you are going to break protocol by drinking, I need to eat,” the Minister said wearily. There were circles under his eyes, his five o-clock shadow was dark, and he was slouching. He was exhausted. He reached out of the holoviewer’s range, then his hand reappeared holding a pair of Mandalorian food-sticks and a box of Mandalorian food.

“Bad day, I take it?”

“Very. Watcher Three and I are both working double-shifts until he can be freed up to transition fully into the role,” the Minister said. He yawned. “Keep me awake until the stims kick in.”

Cipher frowned. “Physician, heal thyself,” didn’t work. There was a reason Lokin was lecturing her about her scanty eating habits and lack of rest.

“You should be careful with those. Stims can get addictive fast for a perfectionist, a workaholic, or someone who likes control.”

“And I am all three?” the Minister said. He raised an eyebrow at Cipher.

“Your diagnosis, not mine,” Cipher replied gently. “I mean it, though. If they become a problem you won’t be able to take time off to get clean with the war on.”

“Only once every three days, I give you my word. You can even give me a blood test when you return to Dromund Kaas.”

“I’ll hold you to it,” Cipher promised. “I’ll do the draw myself.”

“Are you saying you don’t trust me?”

“First lesson: trust no one,” Cipher countered.

The Minister’s eyes crinkled at the corners.

“How did briefing your team go?”

Cipher sighed.

“Vector seems fine with it, or if he’s not he’s not telling me. Lokin thinks you already brainwashed me as a child so this was just numa-berries on the ice cream. Kaliyo is furious I didn’t leave Imperial service and keeps trying to talk me into walking. Raina…” Cipher shook her head. “She’s trying to be fine with me. I don’t think she is, not really. It didn’t help that shortly afterward she asked me if I’d ever fallen in love with a mark.”

“Romanticizing the work is not unusual for new recruits,” the Minister said in between bites. “Your inborn pragmatism is rare.”

Cipher smiled.

“I suppose asking the man who killed your brother for a job is a little beyond the norm.”

The Minister nodded silently. Cipher took a long sip of her membrosia. She wanted to tell him about the nightmares but—He had enough on his plate already.

“Vector’s ex-fiancée called, begging him to come back to Dromund Kaas to have his Joining undone,” Cipher said. “He said he was fine with it at the time. Now he’s in a chrysalis. I was hoping to have his expertise on Voss, but if he’s not out by the time we arrive, I’ll have to make do.”

“A chrysalis,” the Minister repeated. “Like a moth or a butterfly?”

“In the cargo bay,” Cipher confirmed.  She held her hand out even with her waist. “About this high. I practically had to beat Lokin away with my rifle stock. He hasn’t cast an experimental eye on me, but I forbade him from even thinking about going fringe-science my crew. He’s not particularly pleased with me right now.”

The Minister was huffing air out his nose.

“This is not funny.”

“No,” the Minister agreed slowly. “But some things never change and I am very tired. Please try to work your charm on Voss. Their prophetic powers on our side would be of great benefit. Even if you can’t sway them to ally with the Empire, at least make certain they don’t join in with the Republic.”

“Understood,” Cipher agreed. The Minister straightened. His eyes were suddenly brighter, and his shoulders squared to their usual discipline. The stims had taken effect.

“There they are. Take care, Cipher.”

“You, too.” Cipher disconnected the call. She traced her finger around the edge of her holocomm, sipping her bug milk and watching hyperspace.

~*~

Their contact on Voss was a deep-cover agent who, despite the length of his assignment, still felt nothing but revulsion for the Voss. They were certainly a xenobiological anomaly: humanoid in frame and speech; insectoid in coloration and brightly-colored compound eyes; but with a humid reptilian smell. Their culture was unusual as well, distant and -- from what “Bas-Ton” said -- utterly stagnated by their rigid caste hierarchy.

However, any progress with either assimilating them into the Empire or finding the conspirators’ plans would be impossible without following in the Shining Man’s footsteps. That meant becoming Voss, so Cipher swallowed her apprehensions. Aiding them against the fully-reptilian Gormak to cultivate a reputation as a local hero was the easy part.

Following their rituals to the letter was more challenging. The Empire lent itself to proactivity and passion, which were anathema to the Voss. The insights gained from listening to Phi-Ton and his family helped Cipher choose the Voss-approved course tremendously. Those insights were also worrying, given what Cipher was discovering about the Voss’s previous alliance with the Jedi.

As studiously as Cipher tampered with the evidence of the Jedi’s history, she cultivated Bas-Ton’s family. The Jedi had no such counterpart within the Voss. They were strictly outsiders. Cipher, on the other hand, was the esteemed friend of a well-established teahouse owner and his family. Phi-Ton certainly found her exotic, a fascination Cipher cultivated ruthlessly. The sick feeling it gave her was new and unwelcome.  

Bas-Ton had invited her to sleep in his home to further mark her as different from other outsiders. The Voss slept on thin mats they rolled up in the morning. Cipher and Vector were given mats spread out on the living room floor.

The night before she was to take the Trials, Cipher dreamed.

_She was in a darkened room. The stink of Nar Shaddaa was heavy in the air, even though the room was sealed. Vector was tied to a medical bed, and Ardun Kothe stood over him._

_“The Republic doesn’t believe in torture,” Ardun said, “but Imperial Intelligence is well-versed in the art.”_

_“This isn’t necessary,” Cipher pleaded. “Vector is Killik. They have no concept of betrayal nor forgiveness. They do only what is best for the nest. Do you really think the Killik, who aren’t even near-human like the Chiss or Rattataki, are better off under the Empire?”_

_“And is that why you defected? To save the Killik? Or were you simply… following Vector?” There was nothing but disbelief in Ardun’s voice._

_“I didn’t leave the Empire,” Cipher stated her cover story with far more firmness than she’d intended. “I left the Sith. They are destroying the Empire from within.”_

_“And if the Republic is the enemy of the Sith, then we are your friend?”_

_“We use the resources we have.”_

_Ardun hummed._

_“Keyword: onomatophobia,” he ordered. “Torture Vector until he tells the truth or he dies.  Or until you are willing to tell me the truth.”_

_“Do as you must, Cipher,” Vector said as Ardun left the room. His voice trembled only a little. “We are prepared.”_

_Cipher fought Castellan Restraints, but there was no many-pointed star this time. No Watcher X. Just Vector’s flesh, slick with blood, and his screams._

“Neela! Neela, are you all right?” someone was saying, and hands were on her upper arms. Cipher struck the strange voice with her full strength as her eyes booted up. She was panting wildly, her heart racing.

Neela. Her alias here on Voss. The voice was Phi-Ton. Vector was rising from his mat.

The opportunity was too good to pass up, and Cipher was already on the edge of vomiting. Cipher waved Vector away.

“I’m sorry,” Cipher said, reaching for Phi-Ton. “When the nightmares hit—I don’t always recognize people right away.”

“The Ritual of Healing,” Phi-Ton said, turning his jaw for Cipher to examine. “You seek it in earnest, for your spirit. My uncle—thought you might have other purposes.”

Cipher pulled a kolto pack from her equipment and applied it to Phi-Ton. Her hands were shaking. She nodded silently as she worked.

“It’s a drawback of the work,” Cipher said. Then amended, “too many dishonest traders. I give you my word, Phi-Ton, I’m not here to steal artifacts to sell.”

“I believe you,” Phi-Ton said. He reached out to touch Cipher’s hair. He wasn’t the first. There was a reason she never cut or dyed it, despite it being an identifying mark. “Is this usual for your people?”

“Hair, yes. The color, no,” Cipher said. She forced herself to hold still. She’d slept with worse. Phi-Ton, at least, was genuinely kind.

Maybe it had nothing to do with Phi-Ton. Maybe the problem was with her.

“It is lovely,” Phi-Ton said. “Softer than I expected. You are—quite pleasing. You’ve asked many questions of our people. You have honored us by listening in a way other outsiders do not. May I ask a question of you?” 

Cipher nodded. She pulled the expended pack away. Phi-Ton’s jaw was good as new.

“I have noticed some of your kind touching mouths. Is this a ritual you would share with me?”

Her path was clear. This was what she had worked for.

Still, when Phi-Ton kissed her, her skin crawled.

~*~

Cipher repeated Phi-Ton’s words to the temple’s keeper.

“My spirit is broken. I am not myself.”

The temple keeper was appeased. Cipher stood before Amin-Le and inhaled the vapors.

“The tree is sick,” Amin-Le intoned, “See what nurtures the roots, and remember your early teachings. A uniform, before it became a mask…”

The first time she’d worn her uniform at her Academy graduation, she had felt ten feet tall: ready to take on the entire galaxy before breakfast. She would protect the Empire against threats too dark for the military and too subtle for the Sith. The cortosis was armoring for her body, but the garment itself was armor for her soul. Ardun had made that uniform a pretense to strike at the Empire. He’d made her take it off to signal Vector for help.

She hadn’t been able to wear it since. As courier or trader, an Intelligence uniform was out of place.

She missed its comfort.

“Who were you then?”

Even before the uniform, she had been Intelligence.

“I served the Empire, even as a child.”

“Consider the seasons that shaped the tree. First a season of fire. You stamped out a spark. You could not purge the darkness; none but you could have tried.”

That much was true: she had the seasoned experience of an agent of decades’ service, but the physical vitality of youth.

“Then a season of famine. You stood alone; friends and foes carved the wood of your mind. Speak of the wound. Speak of your strength.”

She saw them in the mists: the Minister, Watcher X, Jadus, Ardun, and Hunter. Jadus had been willing to burn whole cities to destroy his foes. Ardun and Hunter had been the same. She’d stopped them. She had saved the people of the Empire.

Parts of the Empire were now turned against her because of it.

“No matter how many lies I live, I do fight for a reason. My strength is there,” Cipher paused. Amin-Le’s bearing demanded honestly. The nightmares, the discomfort with seducing Phi-Ton. Her… difficulties in maintaining proper decorum with the Minister. “But it wavers.”

“It is strength only if you truly understand,” Amin-Le said. Her voice was low and deep. “Now you are in a season of mists. All things are obscured. Your spirit shines, but it is trapped. You must change: what will you become?”

Cipher did not know.

“Changing identities is what I do best. I’ll be… whatever I have to be.” Whatever got the job done.

“Then only you will know when you are truly healed,” Amin-Le said.

The temple keeper declared her whole, and bade her to store the record of her ritual in their repository.

Cipher didn’t feel whole at all. But she had the Shining Man’s remains and her mission, which would have to be enough.

~*~

Hunter’s newest puppet was Faathra. She dispensed with Faathra’s new goons as easily as she’d dispensed with his last.

“For the record, I don’t enjoy this,” Cipher said before she pulled the trigger for the final kill.

She sent Faathra’s head by courier to Nem’ro, courtesy of the Red Blade. It was the least she could do after destroying his factory.

The look Vector gave her was troubled.

~*~

The only way to see the map carvings to the Chamber of Ashes was to be Voss. Phi-Ton had a ready solution.

It should have been easy. Simple. Bas-Ton was an operative and he had set her on this path, the same path he had walked. Cipher could not refuse to make the same sacrifice he had.

It didn’t change the fact that when Phi-Ton said “marriage” Cipher could barely breathe past the sudden panic.

It risked blowing her cover, but she offered Phi-Ton the chance to back out three times while they prepared for the wedding. Phi-Ton was adamant the marriage was what he wanted.

“You’re really going to marry a Voss? But then, we’ve always questioned your taste in men,” Vector teased as they waited for the ceremony to begin.

“If I wanted Phi-Ton, you would know it,” Cipher hissed sharply. “But we need this, and I need your support.”

The scent of cinnamon filled the air. Killik nesting-pheromones, secreted to soothe the young.

“You have it.” Vector’s manner was grave. Cipher forced herself to inhale the pheromones. She let them soothe her limbic system. “The groom comes now.”

“To be proper, we would ride boliphants through the incense clouds,” Phi-Ton said, a faint smile on his lips. “This is proper enough. You, who have no family, come to join the family of Niya-Ton, who birthed Zhi-Ton under the Prophecy of Ten Thousand Seeds. You come to bind yourself to a son of Bas-Ton. We are children. Will you become Voss with me?”

The pheromones were working. She could speak the words of the ceremony in a clear voice.

“I will become Voss with you, a child no longer.” To the Voss, you were a child until you married no matter how much life you lived in the mean-time. By human reckoning she had never been a child. Only a spy.

“Will you embrace the traditions of our people? Will you walk with the Voss to our destiny?” Phi-Ton asked.

“I will walk the thousand-year path,” Cipher lied formally, “so long as you are beside me.” She would embrace the Voss traditions to stop the Star Cabal. She would walk with the Voss only so long as they walked with the Empire. This marriage was a sham no different from her defection to the Republic. “Phi-Ton, will you pledge your dreams? Pour your life into my cupped hands, as I will for you?”

Another lie: there were only two men’s hands she would pour her life into without question. Phi-Ton wasn’t one of them.

“I would have no other,” Phi-Ton said.

“Then we walk before the flame,” Cipher stated.

“So long as prophesy allows, we are one. Only the word of a Mystic will break our bond. May it never happen.” Phi-Ton smiled. “Only the Rite of Ardor remains. We may finish here if you like. On Voss, our passions are suppressed until marriage. The Rite of Ardor awakens intensity and creates a bond between husband and wife. Will you spend this night with me?”

Phi-Ton wasn’t Hunter. He couldn’t possibly know how unwilling Cipher was. He was only asking, not threatening to make her yield with mind-control.

Cipher had always followed through with her marks before. It established the validity of her promises in case she needed to promise the mark something in the future. It ensured she parted company with the mark on good terms. Most of the time it was at least a little enjoyable.

And for Phi-Ton—Emperor’s name. No sex outside of marriage meant that, unintentionally, she had taken his only chance.

Cipher had her training. She should be able to do this.

Restricted duty meant no undercover work, nothing psychologically taxing. She had failed her psychological evaluation on her own merits. This mission was proof.

Phi-Ton didn’t deserve this.

“My work is dangerous,” Cipher said softly. “If I am gone from here for more than six months, declare me dead and remarry. I can’t—I don’t want you to miss the chance to have a real marriage waiting for me. The Healing didn’t work, Phi-Ton. If I panic, really panic, while we—I could easily kill you. It’s not safe.”

“The Healing always works,” Phi-Ton stated.

“No one has gone to the Ritual of Healing with what Cipher has suffered,” Vector said simply. “We can guarantee it. We are stronger than you, faster, trained in combat -- and we would not try if we were you.”

Phi-Ton did not understand, but he let the matter drop.

~*~

Life in Imperial Service was a ticking countdown. Cipher had never believed she’d live forever. But she had believed she’d die Intelligence.

When Cipher returned from Voss, she discovered that Hunter’s revenge had exceeded her worst estimations.

The Sith Council, at the Star Cabal’s urging no doubt, had gutted Imperial Intelligence for raw resources. The Minister no longer had a department. He no longer needed a courier. But they had graciously agreed to his request to send Cipher to Corellia.

After briefing her crew and setting course for Corellia, Cipher stood before the mirror in her quarters and stared at herself in her new uniform. Cipher Nine had been transferred to the Navy unwillingly when the old Cipher Nine had been transferred away from the Navy unwillingly – the irony was not lost on her.

The Voss had said she would have to change. She had agreed to become whatever was necessary.

“But if I’m not asset or agent,” Cipher whispered to her alien reflection, “what am I?”

Kaliyo would have known, but the Star Cabal had taken her away as well.


	15. Lieutenant Ordo and the Minister of Intelligence

She had joined Intelligence under her retirement alias, and it was that alias that the Navy used. Her service record entitled her to the rank of Lieutenant.

Trage said not to expect any “flexibility” in her current role. He was immediately undercut by Lord Razer, who sent the Lieutenant on a solo infiltrate-and-tag mission that was the very definition of “flexible.”

It certainly gave her the ability to steal Republic files for Lord Razer at her mysterious ally’s behest.

Razer was unconcerned by the report of Havoc squad and a Jedi-led army of aliens closing in, but his military subordinates were not. Once the data had been handed over to the analysts, the Lieutenant contacted her mysterious ally.

Reports of Keeper’s incapacitation were wildly exaggerated.

Keeper informed the Lieutenant that she needed an accurate report on the military’s forces from Moff Zamar to compare to the copy the Star Cabal would eventually release.

Keeper’s plan-making hadn’t improved: forcing a high-ranking military officer to land in a Republic-occupied warzone with nothing more than a codeword that may or may not backfire horribly was bantha-poodoo crazy.

Unlike the last insane plan, this plan was the only one the Lieutenant had. She would simply have to keep the Moff safe herself. The plus side was that rescuing him would give her the legitimate cover she needed for her new military masters.

The Lieutenant decimated the Republic soldiers around her false landing beacons.

“Chromatic” did not backfire: the guards let her into the see the Moff. Zamar mused aloud about the word. Just as the Lieutenant was resigning herself to having to murder the Moff and take the report off his body—

“I guess I owe him that much,” Zamar said. He handed over a copy of the report.

There could be only one “him” to which Zamar was referring. The Lieutenant didn’t bother to hide her relief.

“Thank you, sir,” the Lieutenant replied. “Let’s get you to safety.”

~*~

When she returned to base to transmit her report to Keeper, she arrived to see a pair of Jedi defeat Lord Razer.

They weren’t difficult to kill.

But then again, that was the reason for her Restraints in the first place.

“Keep that up and we’re going to start calling you Jedi-Killer,” Major Nedecca said. She wasn’t happy about Razer’s defeat: her team would be split up and sent on to more “deserving” Sith.

Given what the Lieutenant now knew about the Empire’s odds, she couldn’t blame the Major.

“Do you know anything about creating a guerrilla force?” the Lieutenant asked.

Major Nedecca promised to think about it. The Lieutenant hoped she would: it was the only way the Major’s people were going to survive this conflict.

Keeper’s analysis was grim: every advantage the Empire thought it had was a lie. Darths Baras, Vowrown, and Thanaton were blowing troops on Sith infighting that the Empire couldn’t afford to lose. That combined with the Republic’s reinforcements meant Corellia would be a blood-bathed stalemate of mutual annihilation.

The Star Cabal had promised the Voss that the Empire and the Republic would be no more.  

It was no empty promise.

Keeper’s response-plan was desperate: the Lieutenant was to infiltrate their floating airship, break under torture, and supply false information that -- if believed -- would make the Cabal falter. In that chaos, Keeper would be able to find their zero base for a final assault.

The Lieutenant had always believed she’d die Intelligence. It looked like she was going to get her wish, in a roundabout way.

~*~

The Apocalypse Party had Hunter in a good mood, and he was true to form: not only did he gloat about ending Intelligence and sending Kaliyo to trial, he also laid out his entire plan just to show the Lieutenant how out of her league and insignificant she was.

But he also wanted to know the contents of Moff Zamar’s report and who the Lieutenant had told. Not so insignificant, then.

The remains of the coma gas made it difficult to think, to feel much of anything.

“You should have kept your programming,” Hunter’s hologram said, “it would’ve made this a whole lot less painful.”

~*~

_Torture as intimidation was highly effective, especially for setting up a “villain investigator” as a foil to the “good” one, or to force someone to confess to something they didn’t do._

_Torture as information extraction boiled down to conditioning: pain for defiance, lessening pain for cooperation (no matter how small), then escalating that small cooperation into greater aid. In the Lieutenant’s opinion, it was clumsy and far from full-proof. Some people cracked and gave good intel; some people resisted and told you nothing; some people just fell apart and ended up useless; and some who knew nothing told very convincing lies to stop the pain -- which could waste an investigator’s precious time._

_“We can tell you to recite your designation and service number in your head to give you something to scream other than the truth, to remember what you’re enduring for,  and we can tell you to try for suicide when you feel yourself about to break. We can give you a chance to practice here,” her Academy instructor had told the class, “but it’s only practice. Whenever the time comes to truly resist, it’s all on the individual: your character and your biology, whichever cracks first.”_

The Lieutenant hadn’t been given her service number before being sent to fight on Corellia. Her name was a lie, her rank held no meaning.

If she cracked too early Hunter wouldn’t believe her. But how to tell how long was long enough? Could she resist that long?

The mercenaries started with beatings, which the Lieutenant endured silently, then graduated to electricity. The Lieutenant screamed.

The scent of cinnamon was strong in the air, as well as the verbine-smell of combat pheromones. Vector called encouragements, so they knocked him unconscious.

Force-sensitives used the Force, but they were also used by it. Master and servant both. The Star Cabal wanted to eliminate the Light side’s voice as well as the Dark’s, so that Force-blinds could rule without interference. Would the living Force permit such a thing?

The Lieutenant reached for the pale white light she’d felt in the Revanite camp.

_Tell me when they will believe, steel me to resist that long, and I will silence those who would silence you._

The many-pointed star burned.

_It was supposed to be a simple bank job: get in, access the safety deposit box for InGen, steal their plans for a new combat adrenal, and get out. They’d counted on the police and the bank security. The SIS had been a surprise._

_They’d escaped security. They’d escaped the police. But with SIS closing in, Cipher Nine had handed Thirteen the data crystal and told her to run._

_“You’re not letting them catch you!”_

_“I am. And while they are interrogating me about the crystal’s location, you will be taking it to the listening post. Now, go!”_

_The mission was most important. Thirteen took the data and ran._

_She gave the crystal to Fixer Three-twenty-four. Thirteen told them of Nine’s capture and begged him to send help._

_“He will have already taken his poison by now,” Fixer Three-twenty-four said dispassionately. “If your talents are still deemed useful, you will be given to the new Cipher Nine.”_

_Fixer Three-twenty-four had always hated Nine._

_“And you hope it’s you, you jealous creep!”_

_She wasn’t leaving her partner._

_“Let her go,” Fixer Three-twenty-four ordered as Thirteen fled the listening post. “She’ll be back when she tires of wandering the streets looking for his corpse.”_

The mercenaries switched back to beating. The Lieutenant was certain they broke a rib. They pulled two of her teeth. The copper-and-salt taste of blood filled her mouth.

_Nine wouldn’t have taken his poison because he was buying Thirteen time. But he would also know Thirteen would be back as soon as the objective was complete. He would have squeezed his wounds to leave blood drops, dragged one foot to leave marks in the street slime and trash._

_Thirteen returned to where they’d parted and searched for the trail. The marks were distant. Several times she’d been on the verge of doubling-back in despair only to find the next hint._

_The SIS safehouse was in the basement of a hotel used for easy trade. Thirteen listened at the door. The SIS operative was female. Between blows she was mocking Nine’s height and threatening to have her (presumably male) partner do things to Nine that Thirteen had no intention of allowing._

_In a place like this no one would respond to a cry for help. But a cry of fire—_

_It had been her old gang-leader’s favorite way to make a rival gang flee their den. She’d never done it herself, but she’d heard her brother describe the procedure enough times._

_She disconnected the power packs from two parked speeders and dragged them over to the piles of street litter against the building. Her brother had never mentioned the color of the wires he used to create the spark. It took Thirteen four tries to discover it was red and black. She blew gently on the fire, and once it was roaring, she threw the second power pack in. She ran to the edge of the street._

_“One Dromund Kaas, Two Dromund Kaas, Three Dromund Kaas--”_

_The power packs exploded, engulfing half the building in flames._

_Thirteen put on her best hysterical child act and screamed, “Fire! Fire!”_

_The SIS would either leave Nine behind to burn (and Thirteen would run inside and release his restraints) or try to move him._

_They tried to move him. The partner was indeed male. Still performing as a hysterical child, Thirteen ran up to the woman SIS officer._

_“Please, you have to help, my mommy’s still inside!”_

_“Do we look like the police, kid? Get lost.”_

_“Please, she’s my mother, please!” Thirteen had been recruited as a pickpocket, and the key-fob to Nine’s restraints was clearly visible. When the SIS belted Thirteen across the face, she grabbed the fob. Thirteen pushed the button. Then she launched herself up from the ground and headlong into the woman’s center of gravity. The agent tipped backwards into the flames. She rolled out right away, trying to smother her burning clothes._

_The distraction was enough for Nine to free himself and engage the male SIS agent. He disarmed the male agent, then shot both SIS with the male agent's blaster._

They were back to electricity. The second mercenary was certainly straight: he kept focusing the shocks on her breasts.

_When they made it back to the listening post, Fixer Three-twenty-four looked like a Dark Lord had carved his spleen out with a lightsaber and handed it to him on a plate. Fixer Four-seven-five, the listening post’s medic, was more charitable as he patched Thirteen and Nine up._

_“We all thought you were crazy,” he said to Nine, “re-disciplining to Concealment and running solo with a kid for backup.”_

_Nine reached over and ruffled Thirteen’s hair. Thirteen preened: hair-ruffling meant “job very well done.”_

_“Adult partners were proving hazardous to my health,” Nine told the medic. Two of his scars were from previous partners trying to murder him. “We use the resources we have.”_

Eleven years old, and the Minister had trusted her to save his life.

The Lieutenant had no designation, no name, and she was no longer Intelligence. Kaliyo was in jail, her team far away, and Vector was unconscious not four feet from her. The Lieutenant was alone.

The Minister was trusting her still.

“‘We use the resources we have?’” The first mercenary repeated Thirteen’s litany. “What the Hell is that supposed to mean?”

“High pain threshold,” his partner said. “She keeps lapsing in and out.”

The many-pointed star was still burning. She was no Jedi, and would never be, but in this moment – the Lieutenant was all the living Force had. No Force-user would have been left alive long enough to get this close, would have caught Hunter’s attentions.

The second mercenary hit her again. Blows to the face hurt more, with her two molars removed.

“Look, we could do this forever. Ready to talk?”

The many-pointed star blazed. Now.

“Moff Zamar’s report – it showed we didn’t have enough troops,” the Lieutenant choked past the blood in her mouth. “Reinforcements are on the way. A fleet from the Auril Sector, led by a Sith Lord.”

“Tell the boss, now,” the first mercenary said to the second. To the Lieutenant he said, “relax. Vacation’s over, you get to check out.”

The Lieutenant slumped forward, as if her strength had given out.

“We gonna kill her?” asked one of the goons.

“She’s probably dying already,” Hunter’s voice said. “Drop her and the boyfriend on the ground. The Imperials will blame the Republic, won’t go asking any questions that way.”

As soon as the ship lifted off, Vector sat up. The verbine-and-cinnamon-smell was still strong. He’d been faking unconsciousness to release his pheromones unimpeded, increasing the Lieutenant’s stamina and helping her endure. Clever, clever.

“This is going to hurt, but don’t flinch,” Vector said. He pulled open her uniform to access her wounds. He hissed slowly. The Lieutenant felt something with many feet drop onto her stomach and crawl across to her broken rib—

The feeling of injection did hurt, but the pain soothed right afterwards. Vector’s emissaries were tending her wounds.

Vector removed one of his gloves, then pressed lightly on the Lieutenant’s jaw. He slid a finger inside, rubbing the pad against where the Lieutenant’s molar had been. She felt something stringy and sticky beside her tongue.

He was using the spinnerets he’d used to create his chrysalis to bandage her mouth. He rubbed again on the other side of her jaw, then pulled his finger out. He wiped the blood and spit off on the corner of his coat.

When the emissaries had finished injecting whatever it was into the wounds on her core, Vector rested his arm on the Lieutenant’s stomach so the emissaries could re-enter his flesh. Her extremities could wait until the next time she saw Doctor Lokin. The Lieutenant pulled her undershirt down, then rebuttoned her blouse and jacket.

“Thank you,” the Lieutenant said formally. “And thank your emissaries for me.”

“We will.”

The Lieutenant pushed herself up. Keeper’s masked disguise said the channel was not secure, and directed her to a console.

“Twenty hours, thirty-two minutes.” There was relief in Keeper’s voice. “I really thought I’d made a mistake, but you’re alive.”

“It took a lot to plant that information,” the Lieutenant said. “Is it working?”

The information as working, and while it was working, Keeper wanted the Lieutenant to fake her death. It would be the end of her retirement alias. Maybe that made her Thirteen again.

The Lieutenant shook her head as she picked up her explosives. It was possible the Nightmare Lands hadn’t touched her because she was already mad.

~*~

Nyella Hawkins had joined SIS during the same recruitment rush that had allowed Cipher Nine entry. Sent by Hunter, she wanted revenge for the Eagle.

“Run away, little girl,” the Lieutenant said tiredly. “You don’t want the kind of trouble I’ll cause you.”

Nyella didn’t listen. The Lietuenant knocked her out, refused the SIS hologram’s offer of surrender, and blew the building.

“Sorry I killed your sister, Mia,” the Lieutenant told the piles of debris that now blocked her access tunnel. “You were right to get out of the game while you did.”

Vector gave her that same troubled look.


	16. Cipher Nine and the Minister: The Tenebrous and the Star Chamber

“Hey, Cipher, welcome to what’s left of Intelligence,” Fixer Twelve greeted her when Cipher stepped off the Phantom onto the docking deck of the sleek dreadnaught.

Fixer Twelve was irrelevant compared to who was standing next to him.

“Kind of sad, huh? These guys can’t even play a decent game of sabacc.”

Cipher would never understand Kaliyo anymore than Kaliyo would understand her. But after a year of putting their lives on the line together, Kaliyo was a friend. She was alive, free – and had not abandoned Cipher for parts unknown when she’d had the opportunity. Cipher was the first of Kaliyo’s partners who could say that. Of course, it was also possible that Cipher was the first of Kaliyo’s companions to really take a risk on Kaliyo’s behalf.

“Glad you’re having fun,” Cipher said. She could feel the corners of her mouth curling upwards.

“Your old bosses set up the escape,” Kaliyo explained. “I’ve been running jobs for them. The pay’s bad, but I wanted my crack at the scum who messed with us.”

“Us,” not “me.”

“The Minister of Intelligence suggested using her,” Keeper said as she approached. “He’s right, she’s very good.”

Cipher felt her pulse jump.

“Is the Minister here, too?”

“Yes,” Keeper said. “He’s—um--”

“You should not be moving,” the med droid at Keeper’s side said. “I will prepare a fresh dosage.”

“The Minister brought us together after Intelligence was dissolved. He accelerated my treatments and recruited a core of loyal operatives. We’re working to discover the Star Cabal’s base of operations.” Keeper’s speech was odd, lilting and deepening in places. Her pace was inconsistent. “He’ll explain the rest in the conference room.”

Cipher asked if Keeper was all right. The droid interrupting to remind Keeper her dosage was due was answer enough.

“I need to prepare for the mission, but I’ll speak to you soon,” Keeper said. “And Cipher? I’m glad you’re with us.”

When Cipher entered the conference room, she drew herself to at-ease to maintain decorum.

“You wanted to see me, Minister?”

“Last we talked, I sent you to hunt ‘invisible agents’ manipulating the war. How did that mission turn out?”

“It was more complicated than expected,” Cipher reported. “It’s been a while, sir,” was the closest to sentiment she allowed herself.

“Indeed,” the Minister replied gently. “Welcome back from your tour of duty. I’ve spent my time calling in favors. Now we face a conspiracy as old as the Emperor, and nearly as powerful. Pity we have to destroy it. Keeper has traced the Cabal’s activity to a station in the Null Zone. We believe this is their base of operations. Eliminate any members of the inner circle present, and obtain their records – the names of their followers, their resources, and every black project they’ve co-opted.”

“What about those who aren’t on board?”

“With the Star Cabal’s secrets, we can scour the galaxy for what’s left of their membership. Otherwise, they’ll soon regroup. Of course, the conspirators’ secrets have other uses. Once this crisis passes, the Sith will want them in safe hands.”

Cipher took his meaning.

“Safe hands,” she agreed. “Of course.”

“Cipher, when I began at Intelligence, I saw it as a distraction from my military career. Eventually, I grew to accept my role. I developed goals in place of ideals, and I found ways to achieve those goals. I hoped authority would help me effect change. But for us, there are limits to what authority can do--”

Fixer Twelve interrupted via holo.

“Ship’s overhaul is finished, sir – she’ll get to the station out of sight.”

“The operation begins,” the Minister said. “Stop the conspirators, and take back everything they’ve stolen.”

There was something else he had been about to say when Fixer Twelve had interrupted. Now the Minister did not seem inclined to continue.

“Sir, if there is something you want to say to me – be direct,” Cipher prompted.

The Minister shook his head, and gestured that she was dismissed. He'd reconsidered, clearly, and decided silence was the better choice.

Cipher debated propriety. Then she weighed the regret if she died on the Cabal’s space station.

Cipher stepped forward, wrapped both arms around the Minister’s waist, and hooked her chin over his shoulder. Separate from post-coital cuddling, the only time the Minister had hugged her had been on the elevator on Coruscant. This was the only time she’d ever hugged him.

“Oh—Yes, well, Thirteen—I am rather fond of you as well.”

 Sex was one thing, but affection was clearly another. She’d embarrassed him terribly. Still, he rested his hand on her spine. When she let go, he cleared his throat.

“Do come back alive. I would be—most displeased with any other outcome.”

“Yes, sir.”

~*~

Cipher infiltrated the Cabal space station. She observed quietly for as long as possible to give Keeper the chance to identify the conspirators. When Hunter noticed her, he ran – doubtless to destroy the Cabal database or escape with it.

Two of the Cabal council members stayed to fight. In the chaos, she lost her chance to chase after Hunter.

“Vector, your sensitivity to pheromones. Can you differentiate one human from another?”

“This way,” Vector said, running down the hallway. Cipher followed.

Hunter had activated traps behind him to buy time. Doubtless the puzzles would have stalled a human, Zabrak, or Chiss, who would have had no choice but to solve them.

With typical humanoid arrogance, the Cabal members had completely discounted the tactical advantage presented by an insectoid hybrid. Like most members of a combat discipline, they had also discounted the versatility of a Medical operative.

Cipher dosed her and Vector with an adrenal of her own make, which increased the body’s ability to absorb damage. She infused them both with kolto and nanoprobes. They took deep breaths of the stamina-increasing combat pheromones.

Then they ran straight through the exhaustion field. She re-dosed them with nanoprobes on the fly in the middle of the room. They paused in the hallway just long enough to re-dose, then continued past the sentry in stealth. All of their time stealthing on Taris meant they could almost run without making any noise to invalidate the field.

The next trap was lasers and combat droids.

“Shoot the droids,” Vector whispered as he pulled off his gloves. “We will deal with the beams.”

Vector rolled balls of chrysalis fibers, which he threw at the laser’s eyes like snowballs. In the time it took the lasers to burn through the fibers, they were able to cross the room.

They made the rest of the way in stealth.

Hunter was in the process of removing the database when they de-stealthed.

“No way out anymore,” Hunter said cheerfully. “I dreamed about this. You and me, tearing each other apart.” He had the audacity to leer. “Who would’ve figured an Imperial Cipher could threaten us? The Black Codex, back there – everything we are, in one digital box. But I can’t just give it to you.”

It was time to face the monster in her nightmares. Her heart was pounding.

Cipher drew her weapon.

Hunter didn’t go down easy. What started as a gunfight ended in a melee free-for-all that for several minutes Cipher honestly thought she was going to lose -- but he did, eventually, fall.

“Why did you have to be Imperial?” Hunter despaired as he lay twitching on the deck. “You would’ve fit right in – we could’ve been partners.”

Cipher stood over him, panting, her shiv braced to either attack or defend. There was a dull ringing in her ears when he said “partners.”

Having her tortured, the threats of rape -- still making them, even now. Risking Kaliyo’s life with Razer’s arrest. Aiding Ardun Kothe’s attempt to destroy Kaas City. Giving Ardun her keyword. Destroying Intelligence.

“It’s your responsibility now – everything we built, everything we hid from you… you’re the only one like us left. You’ll take good care of it. But between you and me… I want to show you one last thing.”

Hunter’s hand moved towards one of the silver-and-red controls on his armor and Cipher brought the knife down in a hard swing.

“Not this time!” The shout tore itself from Cipher’s throat and her cybernetic display faded out into a red haze. She could feel electricity biting at her hands, pain radiating up her arms. Something wet and hot was on her face, her neck, the sliver between glove and sleeve. She didn’t care. “No more things, no more anything. You are not coming near me or anyone I care about ever again, do you hear me, you sick freak?”

She couldn’t stop. If Hunter got up off that floor, he’d never leave her alone. The twisted lunatic thought she liked it. She couldn’t stop.

“Thirteen!” Vector’s voice finally pulled her out of her haze. His Killik-enhanced strength lifted her up and pulled her bodily away. “He—She—Hunter is dead. It’s over.”

Cipher couldn’t weep. The keening sound she made was close enough. She was covered in arterial spray and so was the room. She could taste blood in her mouth, too much to be spatter from Hunter. She’d either torn the sealant over where her molars had been, or she’d shouted herself raw.

“It’s over,” Vector repeated. He grasped the shiv by the base of the blade. It took Cipher two tries to get her hand to open so Vector could take the weapon. Cipher rested her forehead on Vector’s shoulder. “It’s over.” He kept repeating it until Cipher stopped shaking and could stand.

The Codex was waiting.

“The enemy is defeated,” said a strange voice. When Cipher turned around, two Sith were approaching.

“Honored Agent,” the second Sith said, casting a glance around the room as if admiring a craftsman’s handiwork. “The Dark Council learned of your predicament and sent us to join you. We regret that we were detained.”

“Detained or not, it’s my privilege to meet the Council’s emissaries,” Cipher lied. Her voice was more of a rasping croak than speech. She was so tired. Another fight seemed almost overwhelming. If she could just talk her way out of this--

“Speak of our task,” said the first.

“We know the Minister of Intelligence is operating without authorization. He will face judgment,” the second Sith said, “but you have served the Empire.”

It was exactly the wrong thing to say. The spark of adrenaline buoyed Cipher upwards.

“Other uses,” the Minister said. She suddenly had a few uses of her own in mind.

“The conspirators called it the Black Codex,” Cipher said sweetly, handing over her communicator. “They wiped the main databank, but I downloaded what I could; use it well.”

“The Dark Council will know of your loyalty,” said the first Sith. “This prize… they are intrigued by it.” He and his partner left.

Her gang’s old shell game. The rich of Dromund Kaas had always fallen for it back then, and apparently the Sith were no exception.

“What was that about?” Vector asked.

“My communicator. It’s encrypted, but they’ll figure it out eventually.”

The Black Codex looked strangely like the Infinite Engine that Cipher had found on Nar Shaddaa. Cipher disconnected it from the mainframe. She’d have to carry it back to the ship.

“Are you not concerned with what they will do when that happens?”

“Not anymore.”

~*~

Kaliyo, Raina, and Doctor Lokin had been busy clearing the station of war droids while Cipher had been chasing Hunter. They’d also eliminated several of the conspirators who had tried to flee.

“Love the new look, Agent Blade,” Kaliyo said when she saw Cipher’s gruesome appearance.

“Things got messy,” Cipher agreed. “But they’re cleaned up now.”

“It’s not like you to be so bloodthirsty,” Lokin said firmly.

“Hunter won’t be able to threaten any of you ever again,” Cipher said just as firmly. “The means are unimportant.”

“The man had it coming,” Kaliyo said with a shrug. “I’m just glad it hurt.”

~*~

After Cipher had had a chance to use the fresher and dump her Navy uniform down the waste disposal chute, Vector broke the news to her about Hunter’s hard-light disguise fading when Cipher had damaged it with her shiv.

He wasn’t certain what reaction he’d been expecting.

“So, it would have been a different flavor of rape,” Cipher said, shrugging. She briefly rested a hand on Vector’s shoulder. “Wake me when we get back to the Tenebrous.”

That wasn’t it.

The Hive trilled its worry.

Vector had no choice but to agree. Cipher was still not herself, and becoming less so as time wore on.

~*~

Hunter got the last laugh after all: in Cipher’s dreams, Hunter still wore her male mask, and was torturing Cipher still.

~*~

Cipher knew she should be at least happy, if not as joyous as her crew, when they returned to the Tenebrous. There was an honor guard to greet them, as well as Keeper and the Minister.

All Cipher could manage was interest in the technical details:

“As the fighting wrapped up, a group of Sith arrived. Did you expect that?”

“The Dark Council sent a ship to investigate after I broadcast our target list,” Keeper reported. “They refused to hold position.”

“The post-mortem can wait,” the Minister said firmly. “Keeper, I need you with the technical team. Cipher, with me, please.”

“Give the man my regards,” Lokin whispered in her ear. “I’ll make sure you don’t miss anything.”

Cipher nodded.

The conference room was cool and quiet. The Minister tapped the control panel next to the door once to close it, and again to lock it.

“Congratulations are due, but if we’re going to track and eliminate the surviving conspirators, I need their secrets. Give the data to me, please.”

Cipher pulled the bag off her back and handed it over without hesitation.

“They called it the Black Codex. It should be what you want.”

“Yes, indeed.” The Minister examined the device briefly. “Despite all their evils, the Star Cabal did something remarkable. They stayed invisible for centuries, operating independent of the great powers. In my career, I can hardly scratch my nose without being stymied by a Dark Lord.”

“‘There are things that it is too dangerous to think, much less say aloud. Even in private.’” It was what he’d said to her when she’d offered to kill Zhorrid for him.

“Then let me speak plainly. The lives I’ve destroyed,” the Minister continued, “the atrocities I’ve approved – all of it was to make the Empire a better place. I failed. Now I turn to you, and to the Black Codex. Imperial Intelligence is not being rebuilt. You need to escape while you have the chance.”

“Escape from what? What’s happening to Intelligence?”

“The Sith and the military have wanted our resources for years – now that we belong to them, things will change. The conspirators erased themselves from history. The Black Codex can help you go dark, destroy all records of your identity. You would answer to no one: not a new ‘Sith Intelligence,’ not your superior officers. You’d serve the Empire as a free agent: exercise that conscience of yours.”

The Sith had promised judgment. She would not leave her partner, nor her team.

“Even if I escape, what about you and the others?”

“With luck, I may retire gracefully; without, I expect to be hanged. But the others won’t be blamed for my mistakes. They’ll be your allies on the inside, while you operate in the shadows. It’s the best I can offer.”

The upside to blind obedience was that, unlike in the Republic, as long as the superior could be apprehended those below him would never stand trial for following orders. A “graceful retirement” was a particularly nice apartment in Shadow Town for someone who knew as much as the Minister did. Death was—very much a possibility.

If Cipher Nine no longer existed, they wouldn’t be able to see her coming. If she could just—

The Minister was holding out the Codex.

“You’re putting a lot of trust in me,” Cipher said.

“‘We use the resources we have.’” 

The reminder made Cipher's chest hurt.

Cipher plugged the Codex into the mainframe and issued her commands.

Her first act would have to be identity theft: all her aliases that Imperial Intelligence knew about had just been erased. She wouldn’t even be able to leave the ship at spaceport or sleep in an inn until she had some kind of identicard. She would also have to do something about funds: all her bank accounts would have been deleted as well. The credit chits in her supply caches were now all the credits she had. Without Intelligence’s backing, she’d have to pay for the Phantom’s fuel, maintenance, and docking fees herself.

They were going independent. Kaliyo would be thrilled. Beyond thrilled: ecstatic and smug.

Cipher began downloading the dossiers on the Cabal’s absentee members and major enforcers. She also tagged the fiscal information for each. They’d created this mess, they may as well fund the clean-up.

“No more designation. Not even a name – you’re a ghost with enough secrets to blackmail the galaxy. The Empire’s going to need you. Someone will be in touch.”

Cipher pulled the crystal from the port, then disconnected the Codex.

She held it out to the Minister.

“Actually,” Cipher countered, “you have enough secrets to blackmail every Councilor and Darth in the Empire. Make them retire you. Send me a note when you arrive in Shadow Town, and I will retrieve you.”

“I did not have you retrieve that Codex for my own personal gain,” the Minister said firmly.

“You gave it to me to do with as I saw fit. This is what I see fit.”

The Minister took two breaths.

“Cipher, your loyalty means a great deal.” He placed his hands on the Codex and pressed it gently towards Cipher. “If you retrieve me from Shadow Town the Sith will never stop hunting you. You will be an outlaw, relegated only to the Outer Rim or Wild Space.”

He was not saying he would rather die.

“I know. I don’t care.”

“Your crew would never accept such a fate on my behalf.”

Cipher’s stomach twisted. He wasn’t lying.

“They know how to take care of themselves if they want to leave,” Cipher said. Her voice wasn’t steady, but she kept her posture straight. “We managed just fine with the two of us before.”

“Cipher.”

“Hunter destroyed Intelligence because I mouthed off,” Cipher stated, her voice now fluting wildly. “If he hadn’t, you wouldn’t have needed to do all this. You could have just sent us where we needed to go. This is _my_ fault. I won’t have my partner paying the price alone.”

“The Star Cabal would have destroyed Intelligence to deprive our ‘counter-conspiracy’ of resources no matter how you spoke to Hunter." The Minister's voice brooked no argument. “Even if that weren’t true, _I_ am the superior officer. The fault can only be mine.”

Cipher set her jaw stubbornly.

“I’m not leaving until you agree. When the authorities arrive, they can capture the Black Codex and give it to the Sith.”

“Are you blackmailing me?” the Minister’s voice was incredulous and angry.

“You manipulate me at least once a month.”

The Minister glared at Cipher: weighing the odds that she was bluffing, trying to think up a way to finesse Cipher into giving him what he wanted.

“Miss Djannis is a bad influence.” The Minister took the Codex. “You never used to defy me.”

Relief flooded Cipher.

“Thank you, sir.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes: pre-casting my hots, buffing like mad, and plowing through like the mouse in the "if you don't understand this, you've never met a Marine" meme is how I got through the Star Chamber's traps. I didn't even know they were puzzles until I looked it up online to see how non-heals even managed. Marine Corps family, sue me. ~.^


	17. Ghost

She received a letter from the Minister of Intelligence, urging those who had not yet been assigned a permanent place to exercise patience in the final days of the transition.

If her plan failed, the news of the Minister’s execution would not be made public. All she could do was wait for the next letter, and worry.

~*~

Their first stop was Voss. Cipher could not return to the planet herself without invalidating her death, but she did send Lokin to inform Phi-Ton he was a widower and Vector to inform the Three (on Cipher’s posthumous behalf) that the Voss had been mere pawns in the Star Cabal plot.

It wasn’t enough for the Three to join the Empire. But that, combined with what the Gormak knew of the Jedi’s ancient conflict dividing their species, was enough for them to expel the Republic.

Vector received a commendation from the Diplomatic Service.

~*~

The nightmares were worse, not better, since Hunter’s death. Sometimes it was Hunter torturing her; sometimes Ardun making her torture Vector; sometimes Zhorrid making her execute the Minister; and sometimes she was desperately fleeing but her legs were moving too slowly and her enemies were catching up.

Worse were the sudden jolts of adrenaline in the daytime, making her heart race and breath come fast regardless of what was going on around her.

~*~

The Star Cabal members were too dangerous to risk sparing, as Watcher X had been.

“You’ve gotten ruthless as an independent,” Kaliyo said as they left the scene of their latest execution. Kaliyo looped her arm through Thirteen’s. “I like it. But I don’t think bug-boy would. That why you keep bringing me along?”

“Don’t call him that,” Thirteen said. She didn’t even try to deny the rest.

~*~

She made Nar Shaddaa their home base. It made sense, as independents: easy access to information on their Cabal targets, plenty of bounty hunting contracts available for extra cash, no-questions docking.

Thirteen took to letting Kaliyo and Raina take her to cantinas in her off hours. After a reasonable space of time at the cantina, she made sure they saw her leave with an attractive man or woman. Thirteen would then part company with the mark (or knock them unconscious if the mark decided to be stubborn) and head to a vantage point overlooking Shadow Town until she had to return to the ship.

Her casing was not encouraging. The Republic had launched a raid on Shadow Town shortly after her mission on Nar Shaddaa as Cipher Nine. Security had been heightened considerably. Without her Cipher credentials, getting in and out was going to be extremely difficult.

The brain bomb was still the biggest problem. Thirteen could do the operation. A massive infusion of antibiotics before and a week in the kolto tank on the Phantom afterward would take care of any infection. But the surgery would take time: four hours of time. The guards now spot-checked every inmate in medium-security every three hours.

SCORPIO might be convinced to try inventing a portable dampening field generator to keep the bomb from receiving the boundary-marker signal, one that would be small enough to transport in her med-kit. Whether Thirteen would be able to afford the materials to make it was another matter. Bribing one of the guards faced the same obstacle. Her third option was to identify each guard and try to dig up blackmail material. It was considerably cheaper, but more time consuming.

If she had had the Codex, it would have been easier. But she’d given it to the Minister.

Thirteen focused on the mechanics of entry to start. If she couldn’t get in and out, the brain-bomb problem was a non-issue.

~*~

Sleeping curled up on her closet floor with the door shut eased the sound of her nightmares to the point where she didn’t wake the entire ship. The feeling of being hidden meant she could fall asleep in an hour instead of two.

It wasn’t normal, but she needed some thrice-cursed sleep and she didn’t want the team to worry. So, Thirteen dropped her pillow and bedding on the damn closet floor every night and then remade her bed every morning.

~*~

Raina had opted to stay behind and finish her work on the Phantom’s engine when Kaliyo had suggested their usual pre-departure girls’ night. She was glad she did, because if she had gone out with Kaliyo and Cipher, Raina wouldn’t have been getting her hand patched up by Doctor Lokin when Kaliyo returned alone and quite drunk.

Vector tended to socialize with Lokin when he wasn’t chatting bug-speak with Cipher. He’d been in the medbay when Raina arrived, and a simple burn hardly necessitated doctor-patient privilege.

The look of pained consternation on Vector’s face was fleeting, but far from subtle.

“Promiscuity is a common reaction to trauma,” Lokin stated clinically. “The endorphins and oxytocin of orgasm are a quick fix – but a temporary one. As soon as we can afford it, Cipher needs to take time off. Real time off, away from the ship and away from violence. Preferably with a mind-healer.” He paused, smiling. “We could all do with a vacation, really.”

“As you say,” Vector said. “We cannot, as of yet, afford it.”

Vector didn’t make that look when Cipher was flirting it up with a target or wrapping some shady character around her finger. It would be easy to write Vector’s reaction off as concern, but Raina wasn’t sure: the men Cipher went home with tended toward the tall, dark, and handsome. Vector was the most devoted to their ex-agent out of anyone on the ship. And Cipher was. Well. Cipher. Her grasp of how to manipulate human emotion was on-point, but how to feel it? “Work in progress” was putting it charitably.

Raina waited until Vector was ready to go to bed, then followed him to his quarters.

“Vector? Can I ask a question?” she asked as he opened the door.

“Yes,” Vector replied politely at the threshold.

“Do you like Cipher?”

“Of course.” Vector shrugged. “We count her as our dearest friend. She has stood by the nest in a way no non-Killik ever has, in all the Colony’s memory.”

Raina supposed the question was rather vague. She had been part of the military, she could be more clear, but military bluntness would probably offend Vector’s diplomat sensibilities.

“I don’t mean if you like her as a Killik. I mean… do you like her… as a man?”

Vector paused, then looked briefly down at the floor before returning his dead-eyed gaze to Raina.

“It would not matter.”

Raina barely contained her smile. She knew it. All these spies with their secret-sniffing ways, and she knew it. It was sweet. They’d be good together.

“Maybe,” Raina said. “And maybe not. I’ve seen the guys Cipher goes home with: they’re usually tall, dark haired, chiseled features. Sound familiar?”

“Be that as it may, Cipher has made no such advances on us.”

There it was. Quiet man mistake Number One.

“Look,” Raina said. “I know Cipher’s aggressive when she’s working. But these guys at the cantinas have something else in common: they all make the first move. A girl likes to be chased a little, you know? And maybe do something about your eyes, if you can. The coal-black makes it a little hard to _smolder_.”

Vector tilted his head thoughtfully.

“We will consider your advice.”

“Great,” Raina said. “I hope it works out. You’re a great guy, loads better than the scumbags she’s been wasting her time with. And Cipher’s been real down lately, maybe this will perk her up.” Raina walked away with a bounce in her step. This was going to be great.

~*~

From: Terminis

Subject: A New Home

I have decided to keep my walls bare, here in the domicile to which I’ve been told I’ve retired.

It’s quite a thing to find yourself at once no longer useful and yet too vital to cast aside. My days are spent in pursuit of a better dejarik strategy. Better that than to allow languor to become the keeper of my thoughts.

Overheard a curious story about an old adversary resurfacing to play his games with his toys; I sometimes wonder if you were drawn into this particular shroud of deceit and how you might have handled yourself.

I hope you’ll forgive the personal nature of this message. The truth is, I’ve always admired your intelligence.

~*~

The Killik had no concept of monogamy. Queens and sires who were genetically favorable matches partook in Star-Dancing. Workers and foragers, who could not conceive, also Danced to release pheromones to increase the fertility of those who could. Beyond the single dance, there was no individual bond formed beyond the ever-present bond of the hive.

Joiners sometimes formed particularly close attachments among themselves, but nothing comparable to human marriage.

The Hive favored Cipher’s strength, loyalty, and intellect: offspring of the Dawn Herald and Cipher would be fine Joiners, an asset to the Colony. Houses Cortess and Organa were growing ever bolder in their attacks on the hive. Though most Joiners favored domestic tasks and the peace of the nest, those foragers and workers serving as protectors would welcome Cipher’s skill as a warrior, should she also wish to Join.

Cipher had pressed the Empire into providing House Ulgo’s estate instead of Cortess’s, and it was she who had noticed the Cortess estate’s unsuitability when the workers sent to secure the nesting-site had not.

The will of the nest was sure. Cipher was suitable.

The Dawn Herald concurred wholeheartedly.

He carefully considered Raina’s advice for fourteen days before deciding on a plan. Raina was a human female, and she was Cipher’s friend in a different way than Vector. Her insights were not to be lightly dismissed simply because they did not match his own.

Cipher was reading at a console when Vector found her, scribbling on a separate tablet with a stylus. Her aura was bright with concentration, and there was a low burning worry to her pheromones. Doubtlessly she was balancing their business account: they would be pausing their pursuit of the Star Cabal to run some solo bounty-hunting missions very soon. New bounty hunters didn’t make much, and hunting down Imperial threats wasn’t profitable even though it was just.

Vector cleared his throat.

Cipher looked up, almost startled, and slid her tablet to the side.

“Vector. What can I do for you?”

“We would like to speak with you, when you are finished with your task.”

“Sure thing. Just, ah, give me a few moments to put this away.”

Cipher was as good as her word, and found him a few minutes later.

“You said you wanted to talk?”

“Yes,” Vector confirmed. “But we’d like some privacy. No crew members, no Killiks, no emergencies… if you could arrange it.”

Cipher looked thoughtful.

“Give me ten minutes, we’ll have an empty ship.”

“We’ll meet back shortly.”

Vector could hear Raina helping Cipher clear the ship, before wishing Cipher luck and departing herself. Vector waited, meditating deeply, and pushed the Colony gently out of his mind. The sounds and smells of the ship dulled. Only when he was certain the door in his mind would remain closed did Vector stand.

It was strange, to have the Colony absent from his thoughts. It was… lonely.

_Only for a little while_ , Vector promised himself.

“Vector?”

Cipher was puzzled when Vector met her in the conference room.

“I’m here, Agent. Surprise.”

“Emperor alive,” Cipher breathed. Her medical scanner was out before she’d finished the curse. “Are your emissaries ill? I can think up a lie to explain it if you don’t want the crew to know why we’re headed to Alderaan--”

Vector winced. Cipher was such an efficient killer, he often forgot she and Eckard were the same discipline.

“I’m sorry, I should have prepared you. The Aebea taught me to repress the pheromonic bond.” Vector gently placed his hands on Cipher’s and pushed the med-scanner down. “I can hold it for a little while. This is a time for us to be together, one you needn’t share with the Oroboro or the Colony.”

Cipher let out a breath. He could not see her aura to know for certain, but her shoulders relaxed. She was relieved he was unharmed.

“You’re sweet,” Cipher said with a small smile. “But the man I care for isn’t human.”

Relief and joy. Raina’s insights were wrong: Cipher did not favor the men in the cantinas because they were human.

Vector bowed his head, steepling his fingers at the bridge of his nose. He released his hold on the pheromonic bond.

_Not hardly Killik, but very near,_ the Hive sang to him. _A suitable queen._

“We didn’t know, but we expected to learn one day. We are glad it happened like this. And we are glad to be with you.”

Cipher smiled.

“Trust _me_ with who you are.” Cipher rested a hand on his forearm, gripping it firmly. “Because I am glad to be with you, too.”

“We will remember,” Vector said, putting all his fondness into his voice. The frost-and-spice taste of Cipher’s electric aura was so close.

“When I was little,” Cipher continued, “I made a—terribly stupid mistake. It got my older brother killed. Being here, with you, working like we do… You’re nothing like him, I know, but it’s still like having my brother again. Don’t let people’s talk get you down, Vector.”

He should never have listened to Raina.

He should have trusted his instincts. He’d known, known full well that if Cipher’s feelings had changed she would have informed him. Though not completely unexpected, the disappointment was a sour-apple tang in his mouth and a hollowness in his chest.

The Hive was clamoring. Their disquiet was so loud that Vector had to physically bite the side of his tongue to keep from making the Hive’s case.

He had Cipher’s love. Just not her desire. It was deeply moving. It was also deeply painful. Vector forced his mouth to smile.

“We are… honored that you regard us so highly.”

Cipher tilted her head.

“No, you’re not. I’m sorry if what I said was—out of turn somehow.”

“Do not apologize. We thought-- since you did not bring your paramour aboard when we went independent and given your ‘recreational’ trysts, that you were now available. And perhaps we could be who you wanted. But clearly not. It is no matter.”

“I haven’t been sleeping with the men and women I leave with. I make my excuses as soon as we’re out of sight.” Cipher looked down at the ground, her arms crossed tightly across her. “I’m not available. You can’t be anything but a brother to me. Don’t—Don’t think it means you’re any—less.”

That should not be a relief. It was.

“Why put on such a facade?”

“So no one will wonder what I’ve been doing away from the ship for hours on end.” Cipher’s voice was suddenly quiet, almost a whisper. “I’ve been casing Shadow Town.”

She had not brought her paramour aboard. Cipher was secretly surveilling a prison.

Her crew could not be held at fault if they knew nothing.

“You were planning on leaving afterward?”

“The Sith will never stop looking for us. I won’t have any choice. None of you would approve, or accept that kind of life just to keep him out of Shadow Town. I wasn’t going to leave you stranded: I have a plan for all of you to be all right until you can get back on your feet. Please don’t tell the others. They’re only safe if they don’t know. I only told you because--” Cipher gestured between them.

Cipher was so certain they would disapprove, her lover was in Shadow Town, and she was being very careful not to reveal her lover’s identity. Cipher was a loyal Imperial. Her medical degree was from Manaan, a neutral planet.

“He is not Republic?” Vector asked sharply. He would not support treason, no matter how he cared for Cipher.

Cipher shook her head. She picked up the tablet she’d been working on before, typed a bit, and handed it to Vector.

The letter was in spy-speak. The fourth paragraph was almost certainly written in a code, and the third was a veiled reference of some kind. The first and second paragraph seemed to be straightforward, but were so unusually-worded they could easily be code as well. The sender’s name, “Terminis” was also unusual, doubtless given by parents who had chosen a name for their son that would sound imposing after “Moff”—

Then Vector realized whose voice he was hearing in his head when he read the letter.

Terminis. Ter-Minis. Minis-Ter. Minister.

“We need to sit down.”

The former Minister of Intelligence was Cipher’s paramour.

Vector repeated it to himself again. It didn’t make any of this make any more sense.

“He sold you to a brothel for a year when you were a little girl.” The fact that Cipher had been an asset and that it had been necessary for a mission didn’t matter. Allowing a child, any child, to be used in such a fashion for any reason was monstrous. That Cipher should then as an adult take the man as a lover--

“I did dishes, laundry, put the sex toys in the SteriCycle, and cleaned the floor,” Cipher countered. “He modified the slave collar so it wouldn’t hurt if I was disciplined, and had Fixer put it in the contract that if the Hutt tried to rent me out he’d forfeit the money. The only way a Hutt would do that was if the fee equaled the loan. No one was going to pay that much for a cyborg. Even if they did, he taught me how to break a nose.”

All right. That was still—disturbing. But not as bad as Vector had been picturing.

“He is old enough to be your father. Given your relative ages for much of your acquaintance, you should view him as one.”

“In between missions I didn’t see the Minister. I had my own place. I had my own money, even if K’sella – my tutor – had to supervise all the transactions. I was his partner. There was no unprofessional contact: no hugs, no birthing-day presents. He didn’t even do the banthas-and-flutterbys talk. K’sella scheduled me an appointment with a gynecologist. From my first retirement until I joined Intelligence we had no contact at all because I wasn’t his partner anymore. Then I came back and--” Cipher made a shrugging gesture with her hands.

“You were of legal age.”

“I do the chasing. He does the running around the desk, thank you.” Cipher’s voice was scornful of the very idea of being the pursued.

“Do you love him?” It was, in a way, the only of Vector’s questions that mattered.

“I’m not capable of that.”

“Not what we asked.”

“He’s my _partner_. On occasion, we have sex. That’s all I can say.”

Even if she would not name the feeling as love, it did not matter. Cipher would not develop a rival attachment, and the feeling was one of long standing.

The tightness in Vector’s chest eased, as did the disappointment.

Vector took a deep breath, then another. “We still do not understand, not exactly. But understanding is not required. We will help you free your Minister, and part ways amicably after.”

“Thank you. But it’s—going to take a while. I have an entrance and egress, but the brain bombs. I haven’t figured out a way around them yet.” Cipher swallowed. “Are we… still friends?”

He rested his hands on Cipher’s shoulders. “Always.”

Her aura tasted of sun-fruit and the glittering blue ice of Hoth.

~*~

Protean made their move at last. Lokin insisted on taking only Vector for company, and when Lokin returned it was clear why.

Lokin was now the head of Project Protean.

“How long have you been planning this?” Thirteen asked bluntly. Vector frowned at the rudeness, but Lokin smiled. He promised to reform the department.

Vector liked Lokin, which meant he chose to see the best in him. Thirteen couldn’t think that way anymore.

“You’ll watch Protean,” Thirteen promised. “And I’ll be watching you.”

“But of course,” Lokin agreed, clearly pleased with Thirteen’s suspiciousness.

~*~

Months of preparation and negotiations, and the Killik-Imperial summit had finally arrived. Both parties had agreed to Vector’s suggestion of House Thul on Alderaan as a meeting place.

Thirteen couldn’t attend because she was dead. She could wait on the ship.

“Before we go,” Vector said as he readied the last of his belongings. “We would ask a favor. More than any other Imperial, you have seen the nests and how they function. Your word could carry great weight. SCORPIO will have to alter the timestamps on the document, of course, but before we leave we’d appreciate your honest assessment – one final report we could present ‘posthumously’ to the Imperial summit attendees.”

Thirteen smiled. For the first time in ages, she could almost feel joy.

“An alliance with the Killiks would benefit the Empire immensely. I’m not afraid to say so. In fact, I already did.” She pulled a tablet from behind her back. “No timestamp alteration needed. I wrote this up after you first told me both parties had agreed to talks. I was going to offer it as a surprise, but—you beat me to it.”

Vector smiled.

“We are glad to have it.”

~*~

The summit took almost a week.

SCORPIO declared it was simply not possible to make a dampening field generator as small as requested. She was most displeased Cipher’s puzzle had stymied her.

Thirteen began researching the surgery itself. The Empire was proving canny in its choice of prison guards. No gambling debts, no scandals, no leverage. If she only had three hours, she only had three hours. She would have to find a way to meet the deadline.

~*~

“Agent,” Vector said as soon as he returned to the ship from Alderaan’s spaceport. “The summit is concluded. It was not without incident. Daizanna of the Iessei nest is dead.”

“I’m sorry, Vector,” she said. “I know you two had become close.”

“Yes, we had.” Vector shook his head. “Falner Oeth, our contact in the Diplomatic Service, attempted to sabotage the proceedings. Daizanna was caught in an explosion saving an ambassador, and when we traced it to Falner, he had a… speech prepared.” His voice was pained. When he played the holo of Falner’s speech, Thirteen could see why.

It was the most ignorant, blind, hate-filled screed Thirteen had ever heard in all her years in the Empire. Vector had taught her the Killik gesture for indicating a food store had spoiled, a curving flick of both hands. Thirteen made the gesture at Falner’s hologram.

“We found his words troubling, and his actions more so.”

“He’s one man, and a crazy one at that. Trying to bomb the summit proves it.”

“He’s wrong, you know,” Vector gestured emphatically. “The Colony shares the Empire’s ideals – it only expresses them differently. The Colony allows billions of Killiks and Joiners to serve something greater – the nest consciousness. Just as Imperials serve the Sith and the Emperor. That is what we told the others. That is how we signed a treaty between the Empire and the Killiks.”

It was everything they’d been working toward for a year and a half, finally come to life. The Killik were as safe as the Mandalorians or the Chiss. And like the Mando’a and Chiss, they would fortify the Empire against the Republic.

“You did wonderful, Vector. You should be proud.”

“We are,” Vector said proudly. “And we are proud of you. Both sides will open their doors to trade. Protocols will be set for military and diplomatic contact. You and Daizanna… even Falner, you all brought us to this point. Our furture is bright. We end a verse of the Song of the Universe. Soon we will hear another.”

“If you are looking for exports, I would start with membrosia.”

Vector’s laughter was good to hear.

~*~

_From: Terminis_

_Subject: Any real knowledge or understanding supposed_

_I’ve had a visitor. A figure I will not name wished to see if I had been longing for any particular amenities for my retirement home. The stranger looked around, contemplated, and finally opined that there were nine ways to improve the place. Nothing was asked of me in exchange. I declined the offer, and my would-be benefactor departed. It was a strange encounter; I should think I would not want a return visit._

_If you ever find yourself presented with a gift from such a character, you should disintegrate all your possessions and promptly withdraw to parts unknown. I may not contact you again after this, so I hope you heed my moderately dark counsel in this matter._

The subject was an acrostic: Arkous. He knew Cipher Nine was alive and he wanted to meet.

The Minister was clearly instructing her to run. He wouldn’t be contacting her again to prevent leading this Arkous to her. One message was impossible to track through a proxy web, but each tracked message along the path made it easier.

It was in the middle of the ship’s night cycle. They were on their way to eliminate the last Star Cabal conspirator. Vector was mediating a conflict for the Diplomatic Service. Kaliyo and Raina both were pursuing bounties. Lokin was asleep. If he’d had the helm, Thirteen would have had to spend the rest of the night hiding in her room or else face a lecture about the severity of her nightmares.

SCORPIO didn’t give a damn how much Thirteen slept or when. When she had the helm, Thirteen could use her sleepless nights to work.

There was a Darth Arkous on the Dark Council.

A Dark Council member could simply sign the Minister’s release papers and order the brain bomb removed.

“All right, Arkous,” Thirteen told the letter in her hands. “I’ll bite.”


	18. The Nameless

Cipher hadn’t set foot on Vaiken Spacedock since her demise: it was too risky. Someone at some point was bound to know her face.

She hadn’t called ahead, but Arkous’s droid was waiting for her at the inbound terminal just the same. He knew that sooner or later everyone came to Vaiken as much as Cipher did.

The astromech droid opined she and Arkous would make great allies. It played a prerecorded message from the Darth stating that Cipher – and he addressed her by designation – was the key to his plan to shake the Republic to its core.

“If I could carry a tune,” Arkous was saying as Cipher entered his office, “I would sing of this day. What we are about to accomplish, the galaxy will forever behold with great wonderment.” Arkous walked up to Cipher in full speech-making mode. “But perhaps I’m getting ahead of myself. After all, we’ve never properly met.”

Arkous was handsome for a Pureblood: chiseled features, minimum of tentacles. Judging by the careful tailoring of his clothes to show off his body’s puissance, he knew it. The upper-crust purr in his voice and the steady look in his eyes meant he also wasn’t someone who was used to taking “no” for an answer. Flirting with him would be setting herself up for trouble.

Assuming she wasn’t headed for trouble already. The Dark Council didn’t know Cipher had undone her brainwashing. If they found out her keyword was no longer a fail-safe against harming a member of the Dark Council, Arkous wouldn’t hesitate to kill her no matter how central she was to his plan.

Arkous could easily refuse to bargain and simply use her ‘programming’ as a short-cut. If he did, she would have no choice but to follow his orders.

“My designation under Imperial Intelligence was Cipher Nine.”

“Yes, a pleasure. In my capacity as Minister of Military Offense, I have repeatedly enjoyed the fruits of your labor. And this is my most trusted advisor, Lana Beniko.”

With him was a pretty human Sith. Her eyes had been turned gold by the Force: she was powerful.

“Secrets,” Lord Beniko said. Her voice was low for a woman. Her eyes swept up Cipher’s body briefly before resting on her face. “They are windows, doors, and walls, all at once. You lead a complicated life. You’ve been invited here to perform an act once thought impossible: an attack on the Jedi Temple of Tython.”

Son of schutta. No wonder Arkous wanted Cipher Nine.

“Promising leads have been rare ever since Imperial Intelligence was effectively dismantled,” Arkous had the decency to admit. “However, a source I personally trust has alerted me to a hole in Tython’s planetary defenses. If we act fast and strike hard, it will absolutely ruin Republic morale. Annihilate it.”

“And once we’ve taken the Temple? What then?”

“While you concern yourself with the assault,” Lord Beniko explained, “Lord Goh will be tasked with keeping the temple secured.” She gestured to the blue Togruta in the corner, who had yet to say a word. “So long as we have control, we’ll explore the artifacts and histories stored inside. Imagine all we can learn about the Jedi and the Force.”

“Does Lord Goh have anything to say about this, or is he mute?”

“Lord Goh prefers to speak through actions rather than words. In that regard, he’s a flawless communicator. Your shuttle awaits. By the time you reach Tython, our first wave will have established a foothold on the surface. I’ll remain in constant contact throughout the offensive.”

“Succeed in this and together we will have signaled the beginning of the Republic’s most humiliating end,” Arkous said, his voice ringing theatrically. “Glory for the Empire!”

“About that.” Cipher held up her hand with one finger raised. “There is the matter of my fee.”

“Of course,” Beniko agreed readily. “You’re an independent now. You have expenses. Name your price and we’ll negotiate.”

“I don’t want credits. I want the Minister of Intelligence out of Shadow Town. No brain bomb, no house arrest: a complete release.”

Arkous started laughing.

Cipher held her ground.

“I told the Council they were fools,” Arkous said once he’d gotten control of himself. “They should have made your Minister the Minister of War when we had the chance, and thrown Zaden into retirement. We’d be holding Council in the Galactic Senate chambers right now if they’d listened to me.” Arkous shook his head.

If they’d listened to Arkous, the Minister wouldn’t have had to go rogue to organize the strike against Star Chamber Station. He would have had every right and authority.

“I have a counter-offer,” Arkous continued. “Your Minister authorized most of the current residents in Shadow Town to be there. His home is decently furnished, but he can’t step outside it nor can anyone but the most trusted guards be allowed in.”

That was why she’d never seen him in the medium-security yard. Cipher’s stomach clenched. His small home would have a gym, kitchen, diversions of some form. It wouldn’t matter. To have known the galaxy, and then be confined alone with no windows: it was so much worse than Cipher had pictured.

“If you succeed in taking the Temple, I will send your Minister on his way. With,” Arkous raised his hand in the same gesture Cipher had used, “the caveat that if he interferes with government business he goes right back. He’s not enjoying his retirement. I’m confident he’ll behave. It will be worth it to rub my fellow Council members’ nose in the fact he somehow orchestrated his own release even with every communication monitored and analyzed.”

Arkous stepped closer to Cipher. She could feel the Dark Side power radiating from him just as she’d felt it radiate from Jadus, though not nearly as strongly. His voice lowered to a growl of sadistic pleasure.

“But if you fail me, I will have him moved to a meter-by-meter cell in Solitary. I will keep him there day in and out until his mind shatters. Given the psychological resistance necessary to cut it as Intelligence, I’m certain it will take months. If not years. What is your assessment, Cipher Nine?”

Cipher couldn’t tell if the panic she was tamping down was genuine or if it was one of the adrenaline jolts that plagued her. She didn’t think it mattered.

“I don’t fail, my lord.”

“Delightful,” Arkous said. He waved his hand imperiously. “We have a deal. On your way.”

~*~

“You deserved that,” Vector said angrily as they walked up the gangway to the Phantom. “We have a chance to strike at the very heart of the Republic and you stoop to this. If he had refused your bargain, would you have withdrawn your help and let this opportunity pass the Empire by?”

“If you have a better idea I’d be delighted to hear it,” Cipher snapped as she headed for the bridge.

“Oh, are we getting those new forward deflector screens after all?” Kaliyo asked happily.

“I didn’t resort to extortion for credits,” Cipher said, turning around to stare hard at Vector. There was a difference. He was refusing to see it. “I asked for the Minister’s release from Shadow Town.”

Kaliyo sighed and shook her head.

“Well, at least you asked for _something_ this time _._ Baby steps, Agent Blade.”

~*~

She took Kaliyo and Lokin with her to the Temple. Raina was bounty-hunting, and SCORPIO couldn’t be trusted around a bunch of Jedi archives. Officially, Vector was watching SCORPIO.

Unofficially, Cipher knew she was going to have to be “original Cipher Nine”-style scary for this. She didn’t want Vector to see it.

“No mistakes,” Cipher instructed. “We kill everything that moves. The libraries must be taken intact for the Darth. The rest: sack and burn.”

“You really know how to talk to a girl,” Kaliyo purred, dosing herself with Cipher’s absorption adrenal.

“I want the Minister freed as much as you do,” Lokin agreed as he pulled his robe off. “No mistakes.”

~*~

“The Jedi Temple is now in Imperial hands,” Cipher announced as she entered Arkous’s office on Vaiken Spacedock. Her arm was in a sling, and would be for another few hours while Lokin’s nanoprobes finished their work.

“Indeed it is,” Arkous purred. “All thanks to your efforts, of course.” He held out a tablet for Cipher to take. “Better still, the Republic will be reeling right now, stupefied over the humiliation you’ve wrought.”

Cipher turned on the tablet. The pre-loaded file was a picture: the Minister. The corners of his eyes were crinkled, and the lines around his mouth were deep. For him, it was a broad grin. She could see the edge of a bandage on either side of his neck from the removal surgery. He was in civilian clothes outside a small house with a stunning mountain view behind it. There was an Alderaanian address scratched in the dirt.

Proof of payment. Cipher allowed herself to smile.

“Thank you, my lord. You have been most generous.”

“I have, haven’t I?” Arkous agreed.

Sergent Tarsten ran in. His face was flushed and his breath ragged. He had to have run the diameter of Vaiken.

“My lord.”

“Sergeant Tarsten, do you not see that I have company? Important company?”

Tarsten could barely get his report out.

“Try taking a breath, Sergeant,” Cipher recommended.

Tarsten breathed.

“Yes. Yes, you’re right. My apologies. Republic forces have made landfall on Korriban and sacked the Sith Academy.”

“What?” Arkous spat. “A retaliation so soon? What’s the present status?”

“It’s done,” Tarsten reported. “They’ve taken the Academy. Secured it. And reports indicate Darth Soverus… gave his life in its defense.”

“I see… Leave us,” Arkous instructed. “Darth Soverus made a fine addition to the Dark Council. We should all strive to be as loyal to the end.”

It made no sense. Korriban was too well secured, as secured—as secured as Tython should have been. Tython was the heart of the Jedi Council. They feared nothing more than their secrets falling into the hands of the Sith. Why would they be striking at Korriban now?

“Wouldn’t the Republic have been better off trying to reclaim the Jedi Temple?” Cipher asked aloud.

“It’s… a perplexing matter, but we can’t concern ourselves with it now,” Arkous said. “At this very moment, Jedi walk the halls of our Sith Academy. Our Dark Council Chambers. Simply outrageous!”

“I’m going to coordinate with our forces on Korriban, ensure you have a safe place to land as near the Academy as possible,” Beniko promised. “As with Tython, I will remain in close contact with you throughout the operation.”

Cipher nodded. Visiting the Minister would have to wait.

“A final note: whoever is heading Republic operations on Korriban must be made an example of. Do not take their command lead as prisoner,” Arkous ordered.

The order made as much sense as Korriban’s invasion. The Republic commander should be tagged for capture. At the very least, they would need to know how he’d discovered the vulnerability in Korriban’s security so the leak could be sealed.

Arkous oversaw war, not spy-work. It was possible he was simply thinking as a warrior. Possible.

“May the Force favor you this day,” Lord Beniko said.

“Yes. The Force be with you, and with the great Sith Empire.”

Cipher saluted, concentrating on her joy at the Minister’s release to hide her disquiet from Arkous.

~*~

One hundred and eighty-three days he had spent in Shadow Town, caged like a wild animal in a menagerie who no longer entertained its masters but could not be released because it no longer feared man. The small gym, while effective, was a poor substitute for a body used to running the circuit of Kaas City and the stair-cases of the Citadel. A library terminal and a dejarik board were pittances for a mind used to overseeing a hundred galactic operations at a time.

Though introverted by nature, he’d learned that even with solitude it was possible to have “too much of a good thing.”

The languor had made it impossible to use his sleep schedule to mark time. It felt like he was constantly tired, constantly lying down for a few minutes only to lose hours to sleep.

Some days it seemed that by insisting he live, Thirteen had denied him mercy. Thirteen was the very least of his sins, and just what he’d done to her meant she had every right to inflict this on him.

On good days, he remembered that his current predicament was his doing, not hers.

The library terminal had had a chronometer. Every time 13:00 hours rolled around, he’d scratched a new mark on his wall whether it was a good day or a bad one.

Towards the end, on days when ending his own life seemed prudent, he’d counted his scratch-marks from beginning to end. The Republic had taken three years to launch its raid on Shadow Town. Counting the marks reminded him how comparatively little time Thirteen had been working on his rescue.

Thirteen was coming. She had never given up on any mission. She would never give up on him. And she would never forgive him if, when she finally had a plan to set into motion, she arrived in Shadow Town only to discover he’d broken.

Thirteen would never forgive herself for “taking too long.” Everything he had inflicted on his partner had been for the good of the Empire. He couldn’t inflict that burden on her out of selfishness.

Then his count had simply been up: instead of his weekly supply drop, the guard had wheeled in a medical bed.

“Somebody out there loves you,” the guard had said with a rough wonderment. “Time to check out, old man.”

His benefactors had taken a picture: proof of his release.

Instead of running as instructed, Thirteen had presumably made a deal with Darth Arkous or some other Dark Council member. Perhaps even Zhorrid. As pleased as he was to be out of prison, it was worrisome. He had been scrupulous in keeping the secret of Thirteen’s freedom. He hadn’t even told Keeper. There was no way any council member knew the Castellan Restraints would no longer be effective against Cipher.

While it was possible Thirteen had impressed the Darth so much he or she had been agreeable to bargain instead of simply forcing her to obey, it seemed more possible that whoever it was had her doing something that made her keyword unsuitable.

His new home was on the outermost edge of Thul lands. A born-and-raised Kaas City resident, he had no idea what he was doing.

On his third day on Alderaan he’d been sitting in at the edge of his field with the plough’s instruction manual pulled up on is tablet, trying to repair whatever his first attempt had done to the damn thing, when his Killik neighbors made contact. The Joiner girl was passing pretty, with dark hair and brown skin.

“You are the one referred to as ‘the Minister,’” she said.

“Ex-Minister,” he corrected.

“Then what are you now?”

“I’m… not entirely certain,” he admitted. He picked one of his old aliases at random. “You may refer to me as Jennings.”

“The Dawn Herald wishes to know if you are well.”

It was highly doubtful the Dawn Herald’s curiosity was entirely of his own origination. The feeling warmed him in an entirely different way than the sunshine. It was a kind of warmth he would have sworn in court he no longer had the ability to feel.

“Yes, I am well.”

The Joiner girl cocked her head.

“‘Cipher says hello. She had been detained by recent events, but will be here as soon as she can.’ We do not understand the Dawn Herald’s message, but we believe you will.”

“I do. Give the Dawn Herald my thanks. Your name?”

The Joiner looked around.

“You have to remove the rocks from the field first or the blades will jam.” Her black-eyed gaze returned to the minister. “We were a farmer before our Joining. There are nyala-berries on the edge of your property. Give the nest leave to harvest them, and we will teach you to cultivate properly.”

He did not know what nyala-berries were.

“We have an accord,” he said. The Joiner rubbed her forearms together.

~*~

Cipher had orders not to capture Commander Jessyn. Those orders did not forbid her from trying to interrogate him as they fought.

~*~

After returning to Vaiken Spacedock and being congratulated by Arkous, Cipher headed to the Vaiken Cantina. Lord Beniko found her there. Beniko had the good sense to flirt with Cipher and buy her a drink first. They settled into a shadowed booth. Cipher sat on the same side as Beniko and draped her legs across the blonde’s knees. The Sith Lord traced idle circles on Cipher’s thighs as they spoke, as if all they were exchanging were sweet nothings.

Beniko was winging it well, but it was obvious the Sith wasn’t a spy. She was tracing her circles much higher up than another operative would have. There was no way to correct the faux pas without damaging their cover, so Cipher focused on the conversation.

Beniko had noticed the same anomalies as Cipher. She also sensed trouble in the Force. Arkous was certainly at the center of a conspiracy.

Exhaustion washed over Cipher when Beniko said the word. She’d just finished killing off the last one.

“Fortunately,” Cipher said aloud, “I have some expertise in that area.”

“I’m glad to have you,” Beniko replied warmly. “I must confess I am completely out of my depth.”

Arkous had made his excuses about a trip to Onderon, but gone to Manaan instead.

Cipher had gone to medical school on Manaan. It had probably changed so much. She wouldn’t be able to find out. Being dead, she couldn’t exactly go poking around her old haunts. In fact, she’d have to avoid contact with the Selkath as much as possible. It was a pity. She’d always liked Professor Saleesh.

~*~

On day twenty of waiting for Thirteen to arrive on Alderaan, he stepped out of the fresher to find his holo going off. If they had given Cipher his holofrequency, she would have used that instead of bespeaking Vector.

He pulled on his clothes and answered the call warily. He recognized the blonde Sith immediately.

“Lord Beniko, to what do I owe the pleasure?”

“This is a secured channel, but we could be intercepted at any moment. I will be brief. You must leave Alderaan and go into hiding.”

He gripped the edge of his desk tightly. For two hundred and six days, seeing his partner again had been the only goal left to him.

“What?”

“Do not insult my intelligence by pretending this is difficult for you. I have access to your file. I know all three of your partners died by your hand. Two in self-defense, perhaps, but the last had simply outlived her usefulness by approaching adulthood,” Beniko said simply. “By bargaining her participation for your release, Cipher as good as told Darth Arkous and his associates that you are how her obedience can be assured.” So, it had been Arkous who Thirteen had bargained with. Judging by Beniko’s bearing, he was indeed involved in something disloyal to the Empire.

“I like Cipher,” Beniko continued. “I do not want her to experience letting you be killed to save the Empire. Nor do I wish to execute her for treason should she capitulate. I would ask that you make your farewells in such a way that it breaks her loyalty to you. However, to be frank, I don’t think you have enough decency left in you to be rid of such a useful bargaining chip merely for Cipher’s sake. Beniko out.”

He had placed the Restraints on Cipher because the alternative was her death, and because he’d honestly believed they would never be used. She never would have even known they were there.

He wouldn’t be a slave collar around her neck. He knew Cipher’s buttons better than anyone. Making her hate him was not outside his power.

Whether he could follow through with it after everything that had happened in the last year… That was another matter entirely.

 _What were you thinking?_ he berated himself silently. _That you would be advisor and companion both? That Thirteen would shelter in your home in the pauses between missions? How unforgivable._

There were no happy endings for people like them. There never would be.

~*~

“The Song of the Universe is ending. Our blood flows.”

“You’re not dying on me, Vector, just hold on.”

The alpha-cyborg was dead. They were on the shuttle to the surface. Even with all her medical skills and most of her med-kit’s contents during the battle, Vector was in bad shape.

Granted, Cipher wasn’t much better.

“Lokin, coming in blue,” Cipher barked into the radio. She rattled off Vector’s vitals and injuries.

“I will be prepared,” Lokin said calmly.

The shuttle would have an emergency kit of its own. Cipher ripped it open. She used every ounce on Vector.

~*~

 She didn’t return to Lord Beniko until Vector’s condition was stable.

“Welcome back. Once again, you’ve displayed a skill and determination that few possess.”

“I’ve seen worse,” said Beniko’s new ally. He dressed like a smuggler. He was leaned against the desk like a Nar Shaddaa rent-boy. He had the hairstyle to match.

“Perhaps I should make proper introductions…” Beniko began. Her ally cut her off.

“No need to tell me who I’m addressing. I’m Theron Shan – Republic SIS, and your new ally.”

SIS. The dull ringing in her ears was back. Republic SIS. He knew who Cipher was because he’d read Ardun Kothe’s report.

“So, I’m to trust this man based on your word?” Cipher directed her words to Beniko. “He’s a professional liar.” She stared hard at Shan. “I should know.”

“I fully understand your reluctance,” Beniko said. Cipher highly doubted that. “But please allow us to explain. The way we were fooled by Darth Arkous – the same happened to Theron, except with the Colonel.”

“And between what you found down in that lab--” Theron interrupted. He clearly had no respect for Beniko’s rank or even her worth as a partner. “--and what Lana and I pieced together, I can tell you they’re both traitors.”

They’d traced Arkous and Darok to the Revanites – but the group had changed.

Or at least that was the story Theron had sold Beniko. Without corroboration, Cipher wasn’t about to swallow it.

~*~

When they returned to Vaiken, Beniko confirmed the story with her Empire sources. She also confirmed that the Order of Revan which Cipher had joined was dead. The new leadership had no interest in loyalty to the Empire Revan had helped create.

Beniko traced Arkous to Rakata Prime (with more help from Shan than Cipher liked). Arkous had combined the Selkath cyborg research with parts from the Star Forge – the same device the Infinite Engine on Nar Shaddaa had grown from – to create a so-called “Infinite Army.”

Cipher was working with SIS again.

She kept expecting Shan to try to use her keyword.

A new nightmare added itself to her repertoire: Shan tried, it worked, and everything on Quesh had been for nothing.

~*~

They met up on the shores of Rakata Prime, just outside the main village. There was no way to know for certain, but it could be the very spot Revan had landed three centuries ago.

“It is about time! I thought maybe you got lost!” Jakarro trilled as Cipher, Kaliyo, and Lokin approached. Kaliyo was the best combat support she had right now, and Lokin had the most experience dealing with the SIS. Raina and SCORPIO would be keeping the Phantom and the main base secure. Vector was still in the kolto tank.

“Jakarro!” Ceetwo Deefour scolded. “Display at least a modicum of respect!”

“Hey,” Shan said amiably. “We’re set to move on the Temple of the Ancients when you are.”

“That’s the traitors’ base of operations?”

“Yeah,” Shan continued, as if he was the one in charge instead of Lord Beniko. “The Rakata designed the Star Forge in that temple thousands of years ago. Now it’s Arkous and Darok’s grunt factory.”

“Theron and I will be monitoring your progress from Jakarro’s ship. We’ll assist you as we can, keep you apprised of matters.”

“And I will go ahead of you to make destruction and draw enemy fire!” Jakarro trilled.

“You’ll what?!” Ceetwo shrieked. “Jakarro, I agreed to no such thing! Wait, was this the talk with Agent Shan you powered me down for?”

“Shut up, droid, or you will be turned off for good!” Jakarro told his droid. He didn’t make good on his threat, however.

“Should warn you, it’s a rough road to the temple,” Shan told them. “The area’s lousy with tribal Rakatans more than happy to fight. Found that out the hard way…”

“Wonderful,” Ceetwo complained dramatically. “We’re all going to die. Wonderful!”

“Remain focused and all will be well. I’m sure of it. We’ll be in touch soon,” Beniko said.

“Could I have a private word first, Cipher?” Shan asked. Cipher nodded. She had an idea what he was going to say. He’d be a poor spy if he didn’t at least try to play Cipher for stupid.

“I read your SIS file,” Shan said. “I know what Ardun Kothe did to you, and I get why you’re so hostile to me.”

“And now you’re going to tell me that you don’t agree with how he handled me? That I should remember that Kothe isn’t the whole of the SIS?” Cipher asked with poisonous sweetness. “I heard the same from Chance. Before he did exactly as Kothe.”

“Ardun Kothe was a great man and a personal hero of mine,” Shan said tightly. “You murdered him. But I’m willing to let that slide because this threat is big enough and bad enough that we need to work together. Even trust each other. You could at least dial back the bitter.”

“Excuse me?”

“You’re clearly a loyal Imperial. Your defection was fake. You would have enacted safeguards, too, if you’d been in Ardun’s shoes. So, let’s just put it all behind us and move forward.”

“Try to use my keyword,” Cipher said plainly, “and it will be the last thing you do.”

~*~

Arkous and Darok were already at the shuttle pad. Cipher worked quickly on the door controls.

“Cipher, for the record, I’m really sorry about this, but I can’t take the chance,” Shan said over the link. “Keyword: onomatophobia. Thesh protocols engaged. Reject all commands from Darth Arkous and his allies.”

Cipher’s hands froze. For a terrifying moment, she honestly expected the room to spin and yaw as it had the first time Ardun used the phrase. Her heart raced, her hands went numb, and she couldn’t breathe—but no spinning. She still had control of her body. Cipher’s blood felt cold and her body was burning hot.

SIS. They were all the same. They simply could not resist.

Beniko was a loyal Imperial. Cipher had a pocket-full of data on the Infinite Army to prove it. If she found out Castellan Restraints had been approved and then removed without authorization—It was too risky.

“Orders acknowledged,” Cipher choked out.

“I’m going to enjoy killing that man,” Kaliyo promised.

“We hit them as one,” Cipher ordered. When her hands stopped shaking, she resumed work on the controls. “Burn down the Colonel first. Let Arkous exhaust himself. Then as a team, we move on Arkous. I highly doubt they’ll come quietly.”

Neither Arkous nor the Colonel were willing to grandstand their plan. Pity.

The fight was difficult. Lokin stayed a rakghoul. Cipher switched between trauma medicine to keep her team up and attacking the Colonel. She had to conserve her supplies: as difficult as the Colonel was, Arkous would be worse.

“You’d be a fool to attack me, Cipher, you know that,” Arkous taunted. “Just hold still and I’ll lop your head off quickly.”

Cipher lunged. This was precisely the reason her Restraints had been put on in the first place.

“Keyword: onomatophobia. Stand down.”

“That doesn’t work anymore,” Cipher hissed as she slipped his parry and drove the shiv into his side. She rolled away before he could grab her. The look on Arkous’s face was priceless.

“Impossible!” Arkous gasped when he finally fell. “It can’t be!” He twitched once, then stilled. Cipher wrinkled her nose. The smell of death was never pleasant.

“Arkous and Darok were never going to be taken alive,” Cipher reported to Beniko over the radio. “They were never going to talk.”

“I felt Darth Arkous’s passing,” Beniko said evenly. “This is an unfortunate turn.”

The Wookie was of a different mind. He was glad to have his revenge for what happened on Manaan.

“Blast it!” Shan swore. “Those two were running the show. They were our best hope of exposing the Revanites.”

“No,” Beniko countered, “they weren’t in charge.” There was a reason she was the brains of this operation. “The disturbance in the Force, I still feel it. It’s arrived.”

“We’ve got company! Ships, Capital-sized, whole bunch of them. Can’t tell if they’re yours or ours, but one of them’s dropping in to visit.”

The ship projected a holo.

“As important as Arkous and Darok were to the cause, their deaths won’t stop us. They won’t even slow us down.”

“That voice,” Shan breathed. “I’ve heard it before.”

Beniko identified the masked figure.

“It’s Revan.”

“I almost had the Infinite Army I wanted so badly,” Revan continued. “But even without them, I have enough.”

Revan’s body was short and willowy, like the Minister’s had been when he’d been younger. The draping Sith robes both added and hid any curves. Cipher had noted the odd chambering in Revan’s mask when she’d held it. Now she knew its purpose. The chambering made Revan’s voice echo grandly – and it also disguised whether the voice was high for a man or low for a woman.

It was genius. The Mandalorians made no gender distinction in their armor. Sex and combat-readiness had no link in their culture. Humans, Cathar, and Zabrak conflated warriors with maleness in their ancient mythologies. The Twi’lek, Trandoshans, and Togruta all had pantheons headed by warrior queens. Whoever followed Revan could project onto their leader whatever inspired them most, and none could prove otherwise. No wonder the ancient records couldn’t reach a consensus.

But this also couldn’t be Revan. Everything Cipher had studied about Revan described a ruthless pragmatism worthy of a Keeper. Not bloodthirsty Sith madness. Revan, the real Revan, had had a reason behind destroying the Republic and then destroying Malak’s Sith Empire. Arkous’s plans—There was no reason for it that Cipher could see.

Furthermore, the real Revan was dead.

“You seem rather alive for someone who’s supposed to be a corpse,” Cipher said.

“Oh, I was dead – for all of a blink. I’ve been reborn. My mind is clearer, my power intensified. And now, with the Order under my command, I’m unstoppable.”

“You’re telling me the Revanites weren’t always under your control?” Cipher asked. It made sense. If this, whoever it was, had fooled the old Master into believing he or she was Revan reborn— He or she may have even killed the old Master to keep the rest from discovering the truth.

If they could expose this Revan as a fraud, the Order’s support would crumble.

“At first, I wanted nothing to do with them. I was no prophet. Then I saw them in a new light. A secret group of devotees waiting to follow my lead without question? To help me save the galaxy? I was a fool to ever disregard them. I’ve finally let the Revanites into my world – a world you have to be erased from.”

“Turbolasers are locking on! Get out of there!”

The holo faded.

“You won’t make it to the ships, use the shuttle! We’ll rendezvous on Manaan!” Shan said as Cipher ran across the shuttle platform.

Cipher slumped her head against the console as Kaliyo flew them past the bombardment. The real Revan would absolutely destroy the Republic and the Empire if it meant saving lives. Revan had done it before. On the other hand, Revan’s words about eschewing the role of prophet only to embrace it – no con artist could have written a better speech. That Beniko and Shan had recognized the voice meant nothing: Fixer Twelve could sound like anyone for an hour.

~*~

She dosed herself with both a stim and an adrenal before she met up with Beniko and Shan. The soothing sea air and graceful fountains did nothing to calm her mood as she approached Beniko’s ersatz office. She kept her shiv hilt in her palm, the blade along her forearm.

“You made it,” Beniko said, smiling.

“The way Revan was laying waste to that place, I wasn’t sure you’d come out of it in one piece,” Shan said.

“What are you talking about?” Ceetwo huffed. “I’m hardly in one piece.”

“Switch off your speech processor, droid, before one piece is all that is left,” Jakarro trilled.

Cipher stepped closer still. Her face was a mask. Inside she seethed as well as any Inquisitor.

“Anyway, my point is: glad you got out of there,” Shan continued. “Any ally right now is a welcome ally.”

Cipher struck. She lashed out with her left hand at Shan’s throat, a strangling grip that would keep him from speaking. With her right, she aimed the blade between his ribs.

Shan caught her wrist with both hands. The Wookie roared. Kaliyo shouted back. She’d keep Jakarro out of the picture.

Shan tried to knock her legs out from under her. There was real fear in his eyes: he knew damn well she meant it. Cipher moved with the fall, a desperate scrabble that ended with Shan on his back and the knife only a bare inch further away.

“All of you, stop!” Beniko commanded. Invisible hands pulled her off Shan and held her aloft. Her nails left bloody gouges in his neck.

Kaliyo and Jakarro had also been pulled apart.

“You’re a real piece of work, you know that?” Shan coughed angrily, holding his hand to his bleeding throat. “I helped save you—twice!”

“I told you this would happen if you tried to use my keyword,” Cipher snarled. “You did it anyway.”

“And so did Arkous, which is why I got there first!” Shan looked at the blood on his hand. “I wasn’t even sure it would still work.”

“It isn’t your word to use, Republic!”

“Theron, please,” Beniko said gently.

“Yeah, fine. Whatever. You want to deal with the super-powered nutball, be my guest. Come on, Jakarro,” Shan said angrily. Beniko released her hold on the Wookie. “When you’re done, we can start picking out backwaters to go lie low in.”

“Well, I never, in all my days,” Ceetwo fussed as the trio left.

“I did not know about your Restraints before the fight,” Beniko said gently, lowering Cipher and Kaliyo to the ground. She grabbed both Cipher’s hands. “Theron informed me after he used them. I told him he should have informed me first and allowed me to handle it. He doesn’t understand. I’m not certain I do, beyond knowing I would never wish such a fate. I do understand your desire to end the threat Theron’s knowledge poses, but I need him for this. He has access to Republic knowledge and contacts that I cannot get any other way now that Intelligence has been destroyed. Can you control yourself until this is over?”

Beniko’s face was imploring.

Cipher nodded.

“Yes, sir.”

Beniko smiled, and caressed Cipher’s face.

“Some good news: I was able to extract a good amount of data from the Infinite Army conscription console. Unfortunately, we can’t possibly hand it over to our Imperial colleagues. The Revanites have just proven they’re everywhere: Jakarro’s had twelve death sentences declared on him; Theron’s been disavowed by the SIS; and the Empire’s placed a bounty on my head for the murder of Darth Arkous.” Beniko smiled sadly.

It was like facing the Star Cabal all over again. Cipher forced a brave face.

“We need to put a stop to the Order, and we need to do it now.”

“You’ll get no argument from me,” Beniko said dryly. “In fact, Theron and I have been discussing the best way to go about it. The way forward is clear: Theron, Jakarro and I are going underground. We’ll find a way to uncover Revan’s plan and stop him.”

It had taken the full resources of Imperial Intelligence and all the Minister’s influence to bring down the Cabal.

“Three fugitives on the run against a vast conspiracy that spans two galactic powers? Have you lost your mind?”

“I am as lucid as ever and I say we can,” Beniko said firmly. “You’ll have your own role to play in this, of course. For all intents and purposes, you and your team _are_ Imperial Intelligence. The Empire needs you. Be who you are, but be observant. Tell no one the truth about us or what you know. Above all, do not try to contact me.”

The stim and the adrenal were wearing off. There was a crash waiting for Cipher, and languor with it.

“Be safe,” Cipher told Beniko. “If Theron makes advances or acts as if he’s falling for you, it’s a trap to manipulate you and divide your loyalties. I’m not saying you aren’t attractive. It’s just… standard industry practice.”

“Oh, don’t worry about that.” Beniko toyed lightly with one of the curls in front of Cipher’s ear. “He’s doesn’t… have what it takes… to interest me.”

Oh. Cipher couldn’t keep from smiling with amusement.

“He’s going to be so disappointed.”

“All our fates ultimately rest in _your_ hands. Remember that.” Beniko left.

~*~

By the time she reached the Phantom, she was in full crash. Thirteen hit the fresher, piled her bedding on the closet floor, and collapsed.

Her door rang. Cipher pushed her closet door open.

“What?” Cipher asked.

“It’s Eckard.” He was calling himself by his first name, that wasn’t good. “Kaliyo told me what happened on Manaan.”

He wasn’t going to leave. He also couldn’t see she was sleeping in her closet.

Thirteen pushed herself up off the floor. She wrapped a blanket around her sleepwear. She stepped outside her door and thumbed it closed quickly.

“He’s Republic,” Cipher told Lokin bluntly. “I didn’t know you cared.”

“I don’t. I care about you,” Lokin countered. “For Miss Djannis, murder for revenge is normal. She sees it as you ‘loosening up.’ But you and I know that for killers such as we, loosening up is a very dangerous thing.”

This again.

“We’re all Intelligence has right now, Lokin. It’s not like you can just call the Citadel and have them send another Cipher agent to take over. We’re in the middle of a crisis.”

“The Empire is always in the middle of a crisis,” Lokin said steadily. “It always will be. You are not fit for duty. If I had the means to summarily dismiss you I would. But consider this: there is a reason we keep unstable Ciphers in carbonite rather than locked away in Shadow Town. _When_ you snap, the collateral damage will be severe. How much more damage will you do the cause than if you had simply stood aside now and told Lord Beniko to find someone else?”

Lokin was right. She didn’t want to admit it, but he was. She could easily end up more of a danger to her friends than what she was trying to protect them from.

She was sleeping on her closet floor for the Force’s sake.

“I was planning on seeing the Minister anyway,” Cipher admitted. “If anyone knows who could take over for me, it will be him. Once my replacement arrives, I’ll… Just tell me what I need to do.”

“It’s only temporary,” Lokin said gently. “I know several qualified mind-healers. If you follow their instructions and take your time, you could be back in as little as nine months. You are not the first agent to need post-traumatic medical leave. If Intelligence is ever reformed, you will not be the last. Now, go back to your nap.”

~*~

By the time they reached Alderaan, Vector was out of the kolto tank. The Minister’s address bordered the Oroboro nest. Vector veered left to head home, while Thirteen continued on to the Minister’s place alone.

It was empty. There were layers of dust settled everywhere, dead plants in front of the house. There were no signs of struggle. No indication of foul play.

She searched the land. Given the proximity of the Oroboro, it was unlikely the Minister had suffered an accident and been unable to find help. Vector would have known immediately upon waking if he’d opted to Join. She looked anyway, panic rising in her chest.

Thirteen tried his computer console. No note, no letter.

She began looking for hidden communication, starting with the upper-right corner of the home. She looked from top-to-bottom, left-to-right, clockwise around each room. Just as she’d been taught. There was nothing.

Vector knocked gently.

“He told Aliana that he was going to return to his family,” he said gently. “They weren’t to worry and were to help themselves to cultivating the land.”

Cipher couldn’t breathe. It was possible, even probable, that with the Minister no longer a spy that his wife wanted to return to monogamy. He’d sworn himself to her first. The honorable thing was to keep his vow to her, no matter that Thirteen knew him better.

But surely—he would have said goodbye?

Thirteen clapped both hands over her mouth.

“Cipher, you told us that from when you ceased to be Thirteen until you became the Red Blade, he did not speak to you because you were no longer partners,” Vector said. He approached her slowly as one would approach a frightened animal. “We are—We cannot give proper voice to how sorry we are your feelings are not returned.”

“When I cry, I pass out,” Thirteen warned. She dropped to her knees as the first hiccupy gasp escaped her control.

Vector wrapped both arms around her and pressed her face into his chest. He made slow, rocking movements: left, right, left, right.

~*~

When Cipher returned to the ship, she laid on her bed and stared at the ceiling. She felt numb.

She had always been so sure her partner had cared about her. Over the course of the last year, between the hallucinations and the mind-games and the changing identities—her partnership with Nine had been her touchstone. The one thing in the entire mess that was real and couldn’t be taken away.

It had all been a lie.

Thirteen wasn’t the last of Intelligence, she was a glorified bounty-hunter who did free jobs for the government.

She wasn’t a loyal Imperial. She was running an unauthorized operation with an SIS operative against people in her own government.

She wasn’t a Revanite. The Order had moved on without her and now she was fighting against it.

She spent more time in combat than she did healing, and her medical license had died with her military alias.

Even her pale white light was far away, what with all the not-sparing people she’d been doing lately.

All of it, absolutely everything she’d ever thought about herself, was wrong.

There had to be a reason. Thirteen desperately wanted there to be a reason. To hope for some communication, some secret message that would make it all okay.

She wasn’t even a decent spy, to have been so thoroughly manipulated.

The only thing that was true was that she was a killer. And as Lokin had so bluntly pointed out, she was on the knife edge of becoming an unstable one.


	19. Rishi

Setting course for Nar Shaddaa ended up at Rishi. SCORPIO tore the navicomputer apart and found remote sabotage.

“Great,” Cipher said dully. “Well, someone wants us on Rishi.”

“Maybe Raina and I should check it out,” Kaliyo said slowly. “I’d normally cut my tongue out before agreeing with the Opera Twins, but you look like the south end of a north-bound Hutt.”

“I do. But they probably won’t show themselves for just you and Raina,” Cipher agreed. “Come on, Vector.”

~*~

Everyone on Rishi seemed to have loaded up on spice. They had decided she was an infamous pirate – and not the Red Blade. Vector talked her out of killing her way to a solution by reminding her that her conscience wasn’t functioning at optimal capacity right now. Instead they chased monkey-lizards and crier droids.

Their rumor-monger was Lord Beniko. She and Shan had linked the Nova Blades to the Order of Revan. They’d created the Howling Tempest gang as an illusion so that the Blades could be wiped out without drawing suspicion.

Cipher couldn’t manage anything beyond exhaustion.

“Hey,” Shan said, snapping his fingers. “You with us?”

“Watch your mouth,” Vector warned Shan. He had not been pleased to find out they had allied with a Republic spy while he’d been in the kolto tank. Meeting Shan had not improved his opinion.

“Go kill gang bangers,” Cipher repeated dully, “eliminate the witnesses--”

Vector cleared his throat.

“Free the witnesses,” Cipher amended, “get intel. Got it.”

“Yeah,” said Shan, clearly not convinced.

~*~

Shara Jenn’s capture by the Republic complicated matters. Rescuing her certainly would be interpreted as “interfering in government business.” If he was caught, he was headed back to Shadow Town.

Shara was his responsibility. She had no one else. She was a eugenics creation who had outlived her usefulness. The Empire would not be worried after her welfare. There was no family to worry or push for answers.

Keeper could have chosen anyone loyal to him to help. Selecting Cipher served two purposes. The first was that Cipher was she the most skilled and most likely to ensure Shara’s well-being. The second was that Shara’s rescue was such a perfect opportunity to ensure Cipher’s hatred, it may as well have been custom-built.

Keeper took deep breaths as he watched Lord Beniko’s instructions for at least the hundredth time, steadying his face and hands. There was no way to hide his racing pulse and adrenaline response from Cipher’s cybernetics. If he could keep from displaying any tells, though, she would interpret it as anxiousness over the mission.

Cipher walked in a scant twenty minutes after he’d sent his message from “Jheeg.” He’d heard she was posing as the head of the Howling Tempest Gang. That did not explain her choice of outfit: black cortosis-leather armor that hugged every curve of her body like a second skin. Despite its impracticality during a fight, her cloak was probably the only thing protecting her modesty from behind. She’d adorned her armor with straps, studs, and gold ribbing that went all the way down.

She looked like a sex toy as much as pirate. Kaliyo or Lord Beniko had to have chosen the disguise. He had no idea how they’d convinced her to wear it. Cipher’s skin looked unnaturally pale, and she was wearing more under-eye concealer than normal. She’d lost weight.

 _As far as she knows,_ he reminded himself sternly, _you discarded her without a word in favor of your wife -- after Cipher risked bargaining with a Dark Councilor to free you from prison. She’s not going to look chipper. Toughen up, agent._

“You’re now two meters inside an Umbaran jamming field.” Keeper kept his voice clinical. “If I’ve pushed the right buttons we should have adequate privacy.”

“I received your message for ‘the Red Blade.’” Her voice was professionally calm.

“Perhaps a bit obvious,” the Minister said with a shrug. “But I thought your pirate cover appropriate given the circumstances.” He gestured to her Howling Tempest Gang getup. “How are you enjoying independence, Agent? You haven’t upset the Dark Council, I hope.”

“I didn’t expect to see you again,” Cipher said. She hesitated for only a moment before continuing, “I’m glad you called.”

He had put Thirteen through worse torments only to explain his reasons afterward. She had to be hoping for an explanation this time as well.

“I appreciate the sentiment,” Keeper said briefly, “but I hope you’ll understand I’m not here to socialize. I’ve come to ask you for a personal favor.”

Asking for something else, on top of everything she’d already done, without even thanking her for his freedom or offering a hint of explanation--

“Given what you did when I took your orders,” Thirteen said coldly, “what makes you think I’d volunteer for anything you propose?”

Cipher had never used such a tone with him before. Shouted at him from time to time as an asset, yes, but never such cold fury. He’d underestimated how badly it would hurt, and the strength of his own impulse to assuage her anger.

It was good he’d left himself with too little time for explanations.

“To start with, we have a shared interest. Shara Jenn, the former Keeper and Watcher Two.”

“Go on.”

“After the Star Cabal’s dissolution, Shara was unwell. The damage to her brain from the Star Cabal’s trap had been considerable.”

“I remember her medical droid,” Cipher said. “She had trouble speaking.”

“Add to that her conditioning,” the Minister continued. “She was programmed for loyalty and we had her working a rogue operation. That aggravated her existing cognitive and psychogenic trauma. She’s fortunate she didn’t become a vegetable. During Lord Malgus’s uprising and the chaos that followed, she was unable to protect herself.”

“What happened?”

“She was captured by the Republic. I intend to free her.”

Cipher counted Shara as a friend. She wouldn’t refuse no matter what she felt about Keeper.

“Why do you even care? What is Shara to you?” Cipher demanded. She tried and failed to disguise the pain in her voice. Shara Jenn was worth risking returning to prison for even after she’d outlived her usefulness, but Cipher hadn’t even warranted a goodbye under similar circumstances.

He could do this. He could do this.

“She was my responsibility, that is enough.” The implication: Cipher was not. “I have already made arrangements. She was carbonite frozen and placed on a prisoner transport, which was then raided by pirates.”

“And the raiders have now brought their cargo to Rishi,” Cipher guessed.

“Precisely. The final step is to retrieve her body and erase all evidence. No one can know what happened. I intend to negotiate Shara’s purchase with the raiders. While I do, I need you to provide leverage and cover our trail.”

“We could just kill everyone and help ourselves,” Cipher pointed out. “It’d take a lot less time.”

Since when did--

“What kind of leverage will we be providing?” Vector asked.

Cipher’s jaw shifted.

“To begin with,” Keeper continued, because he really did not have time if he was to succeed in rescuing Shara, “I suggest you slice the raider’s databank and transmit their files to me. That should facilitate negotiations.”

“I’m sure they’ve made indiscretions we can use. And after that?”

“You’ll have the frequency to listen in. You know how this works. You’ll find what I need. We’ll rendezvous back here after I’ve acquired the carbonite.”

She did find what he needed. There was a reason Cipher was the best. After ending the negotiations, it was a race against time to get Shara to her ship before Cipher returned to the half-abandoned workshop Keeper was using as a base.

He made it with time to spare.

“How are you feeling?” Keeper asked Shara over the hologram as Cipher walked in.

“I’ve been thawed from carbonite, pierced by twenty-five needles, and injected with something I can only describe as liquid humiliation.”

Shara’s wit, at least, was still intact.

“I’m pleased you’re doing well,” Keeper said.

“Did you tell me--” Shara was suddenly confused. “I can see stars. Am I on a space ship?”

“Yes, you are.” Keeper used the gentle voice he’d used on Thirteen when she’d been young. Given the current circumstances, it would be excruciating for Cipher to hear. “You’re safe and you’re going to be better soon.”

Shara wasn’t Cipher. She called him on it:

“Don’t condescend to me.”

“My apologies.” Keeper paused the holocall as Cipher approached.

“You said we’d all meet back here,” Cipher spat.

“Yes, I lied. She’s on her way to a private medical facility. I couldn’t be sure you’d approve,” he said without remorse. Shara was safe but his biosigns were still a mess, he knew. Hopefully Cipher was too upset to notice.

“So, after everything we’ve been through, you’d still rather lie to and manipulate me rather than trust my judgment.”

Cipher had no idea how much he deserved that.

He could abort. It wasn’t yet too late.

No. It was a conceit, perhaps, but he could not be certain Cipher’s loyalty to the Empire would hold with a blaster to his head. Failing this mission could be a death sentence for Cipher.

“It’s nothing personal. My wife has the same complaint.” Keeper could feel his pulse, already irregular, skip again at the lie. “Shara will be cared for in secret by a group of richly-compensated medics and scientists. In a very slow and regrettably painful process, the damage to her brain will be repaired and her loyalty programming undone.”

“You can do that?”

“There are no guarantees, but my people say it should be possible. When she is free, I’ve advised her not to rejoin Imperial service and to make a life away from conflict. She’s never had that chance before.”

Cipher’s face softened.

“Talk to her if you like,” Keeper said. “Say your goodbyes.”

He un-paused the holo as he walked away.

“Shara, do you recognize me?” Cipher asked.

“Are you concerned about the hibernation sickness or the brain damage?” Shara quipped.

Keeper leaned against the wall out of earshot. He repeated his mantra of ice and cold.

He had to finish. Pain was pointless unless he could harden it into enough hatred that she wouldn’t care if he died. If he didn’t complete the mission, he’d just psychologically tortured his partner—

If he didn’t complete the mission, he’d just psychologically tortured his ex-partner for nothing.

He heard the soft tones of Shara’s voice cease. They’d finished talking.

He could do this. He could do this. There was nothing but ice around his heart.

“I suspect our business is concluded,” Keeper said as he entered the main room. “I have a retirement to be getting back to and while I don’t expect we’ll meet again: I believe I’ve said that before.”

Cipher held her breath at the cruelty.

He could do this. Ice and cold.

Vector looked ready to kill him. All Cipher had to do was say the word.

“Retired or not, you’re going to look after that woman.” Cipher forced the words out on the exhale. There was nothing but anger in her voice, her brows drawn together in a scowl of disdain. Contained menace was implicit in her body language.

Cipher was threatening him into doing the right thing, when for so long she had done anything he asked, trusting it was just simply because he asked it.

Mission accomplished.

It felt like defeat.

“You’re going to see to it she recovers,” Cipher continued, “and that no enemies find her afterwards. She’s going to live a very peaceful life.”

“Yes,” Keeper promised. “She will. But don’t underestimate her, either. There is one other thing, by the way. I may be out of the game, but you are not. I hear Intelligence is on the verge of being re-formed at last under Darth Marr. A new agency will need new personnel to replace those lost. I have files on potential recruits: untraditional, but highly skilled.”

“What kind of untraditional recruits?”

“Military deserters, terrorist sympathizers, and Darth Malgus’s alien insurgents. All of them believers in a better Empire.”

Intelligence was returning. Cipher could rejoin, return to her old life. She should feel happy.

Cipher did not look happy. She didn’t even seem to care.

“I’m always glad to have resources,” she said faintly, “but I’m not making up my mind just yet.”

Cipher had worn her uniform almost constantly from the moment she’d earned it. She’d been Intelligence for quite literally her entire life. What could possibly have changed her mind so?

He could not ask. Showing concern would be the same as telling the truth.

Whatever it was, Vector cared about Cipher deeply and Lokin was an experienced agent. Cipher had handlers. She also had friends: Kaliyo (in her own way) and Ensign Temple. She even had the homicidal droid.

“Don’t delay too long. I’ve heard rumors of a new threat.” Keeper held out a satchel. The files were earmarked inside the Black Codex. It was hers again, all debts ostensibly paid.

He could never fully repay Cipher for his freedom. He would have loved the chance to try.

He could do this.

“But as I said,” Keeper continued, “I am out of the game. Watch for enemies within and without. Everything is on you now, and you know the stakes for civilization.”

He could not tell her aloud to take care. He could only encourage her to stay in the fight.

Cipher was staring at him, not moving a muscle.

“Everything… is on me.” Her voice was strange. “That’s your answer. Everything is on me.”

“Cipher, perhaps we should return to the ship now.” Vector’s voice was worried, even afraid. He stepped slowly towards Cipher.

Keeper had pushed two partners to the point of trying to kill him. This wasn’t it. He didn’t know what this was, only that his mission had somehow just gone horrifically wrong.

“No, Vector, I’m not ‘going back to my ship,’” Cipher snapped. She took a step forward with a dangerously liquid grace. “You don’t get to do this anymore. I’m not a child, I’m not one of your spies. You don’t get to just take me out for a game and then put me back in my box until you need me again. You’d be dead if I hadn’t given you that Codex. You’d still be rotting in Shadow Town if I hadn’t made a deal with Arkous. I saved you _twice._ If you were a Wookie, I would _own_ you right now!”

Telling Cipher to calm down would only provoke her further. Keeper settled for taking a hesitant step backwards in case he was wrong about Cipher not being ready for murder.

“All right. What is it you want?”

“A replacement. Someone else who can do this job.”

“Cipher, there is no one like you.” That, Keeper meant whole-heartedly.

“Don’t give me that!” Cipher almost shook with anger. “I’m sleeping in my closet so I don’t wake the ship at night; Vector’s playing conscience now because mine is shot; I barely sleep; I don’t want to eat; I keep—thinking I’m in the middle of battle when I’m not—I’m losing my mind and I’m going to get someone killed.” Cipher made a hiccupy gasp. Then another. “You owe me that much.”

Emperor’s name.

Thirteen was on the edge of a breakdown. Given the severity of her symptoms, she had been well on her way to it even before taking up with Lord Beinko. Keeper’s mind games had no doubt made the situation worse, by making her doubt her own perceptions when she’d most needed a touchstone.

He had just assumed she would have rested after the Star Cabal’s dissolution. He had assumed that as a Fixer, Lokin would have known a retired mind-healer willing to help.

“I’m so sorry, Thirteen,” Keeper said softly. “I don’t make mistakes often, but I am far from infallible. I never should have begun this without meeting you first.” That was why Vector approached her so slowly now: her reflexes were probably on a hair-trigger. No wonder Vector had been so furious at Keeper’s deceit.

Cipher let Keeper rest a hand on her shoulder and lead her to the workbench. She sat on the bench. He lightly petted her upswept hair with the back of his fingers. It always soothed her.

“Don’t,” she choked out between gasps. “Don’t pretend to care, it makes it worse.”

“I’m not,” Keeper said gently. He pulled the holotransmitter off the bench. He pressed the play switch, and held it on his open palm.

When Beniko’s words finished playing, Cipher took the holo from his hand. She rewound the recording and played it through again in a trance.

“Lord Beniko is working with Theron Shan of the SIS.” Vector’s dissatisfaction was plain in both voice and posture. “Supposedly, he provides access to Republic resources she cannot get any other way with Intelligence dissolved. We ‘need to accept it’ because the Order of Revan is such a danger to the Empire. Yet, the threat posed is not so great that she is willing to enter combat to support Cipher.”

Lord Beniko was cozying up to a notable Republic spy.

No wonder she had made certain to eliminate Keeper from the picture. Beniko had played on Keeper’s fears and like a rank amateur, he had fallen for it.

Keeper took a breath, trying to calm the haze of anger enough to think clearly. Lord Beniko had used different methods, true, but the result was the same as Fixer Ninety-eight. He could not just shoot her in the head and be done with it, not if she was leading the fight against a danger to the Empire.

“She’s a researcher, not a fighter,” Cipher whispered. She rewound the recording again.

“She is a Sith Lord,” Keeper said sharply. “She could not have survived this long without considerable combat skills.”

Sith were notorious for eliminating an enemy’s troops using subordinates, reserving themselves for the final duel with the enemy leader. It was possible Beniko was sincere in her loyalty to the Empire and her fear of the Revanite threat.

It was also possible she was taking advantage of Cipher’s mental state to get away with treason.

Either way, she and Agent Shan were using Cipher for cannon fodder.

“Darth Nox and the Wrath are the equals of Jadus,” Keeper told Vector, “which makes them the equal of Cipher. They are both reasonable for Sith, loyal Imperials, and most of all, they are coming to the fight fresh. Lord Beniko will be hard-pressed to deceive them if her motives are insincere. Have her give you what proof she possesses. Relay it to me and I will approach the Sith of her choosing on her behalf. Is the next mission something the team can handle without Cipher?”

“Mandalorian camp,” Cipher said. She was rolling the holotransmitter between her hands and staring at the wall. “Kaliyo, Raina, and Lokin could do it in their sleep. What happens if they think you’re meddling in government affairs?”

“The Wrath will care only that I am bringing a threat to the Empire to his attention,” Keeper replied simply. “Darth Nox voted with Arkous for acquittal at my hearing. She said my ‘audacity’ was both amusing and effective. I doubt highly that has changed.”

Lord Beniko and her Republic pet would not be given the opportunity to guilt Cipher into returning to the field before she was fully healed. They weren’t going to see, touch, or hear so much as a _hologram_ of Cipher on pain of death. Keeper would see to it personally.

“This going to be like after Fixer took me, when I didn’t see another agent for a year?” Cipher asked, sounding very much like her younger self.

“It is entirely possible,” Keeper concurred, gentling his voice.

Cipher reached up and took his hand.

“Okay.”

~*~

When Vector returned to the ship, he told the rest of the team the truth: Lord Beniko had convinced the former Minister to abandon Cipher on Alderaan. Ostensibly it was so the Revanites could not use him as a hostage against Cipher. Vector suspected it was to keep Cipher from informing him they were working with Shan.

“He never would have stood for it,” Lokin agreed, leaning back in his chair. “With his contacts and knowledge at her disposal, Cipher doesn’t have to stand for it now, either.”

Vector shook his head.

“The Minister concurs with your diagnosis, Eckard. He gave us two possible replacements for Cipher against the Revanites. It is possible Lord Beniko will not find the replacements quite to her liking, so he is exfiltrating Cipher to recover in peace.”

“Thank the Force for that,” Raina interjected.

“We agree,” Vector continued. “We need to borrow a set of your clothes indefinitely in case Cipher’s belongings have been tampered with. You, Eckard, and Kaliyo will have to handle the Mandalorians.”

Kaliyo shrugged.

“Haven’t killed Mandalorians in a while. Should be fun.”

“Head out immediately, please, before Shan and Beniko become suspicious at the delay. It may be some time before Cipher can contact us, so she asked me to convey her temporary goodbyes.”

~*~

Keeper sliced Cipher’s hair off with a knife and glued it to the brim of a broad-brimmed hat. He had her remove her armor as well, and placed it in the satchel he’d used for the Black Codex. He dumped her weapons and medkit in an alley not far from the workshop. They would all disappear in moments, he was certain.

Places like Rishi were never short on desperate people. It took him a scant twenty minutes to find a human cantina dancer willing to take a free ticket to Balmorra and six hundred credits in exchange for wearing Cipher’s armor and the hat off-world.

“Sell the armor when you arrive,” Keeper instructed the woman. “It will fetch a handsome price. You’ll be able to start your life over.”

Rishi was also not short on criminal scum. It took him two cantinas to find a spice-runner willing to smuggle the pair of them off-world.

By the time he returned to the workshop, Vector had already come and went. Once more he was glad of Vector’s intelligence: he had chosen an outfit that was plausible both as a civilian and as a smuggler. Cipher was running her hand through her short hair. It had to be a strange sensation after wearing it long for well over twenty years.

“Well,” she said softly. “Now what?”

Sneaking away to his hidden retirement with his partner had been a daydream indulged in moments of weakness. Now here he was, about to make it happen. It was probable Cipher would recover and return to the fight later. It was also possible she would never return to her old self.

Operatives and soldiers fell in battle all the time. The war always continued just fine. For now, Cipher was spent. They both were.

Keeper stepped close and placed his hands on Cipher’s waist. He paused, giving her an opportunity to pull away or place a halting hand on his chest. When no refusal was forthcoming, he tilted his head and pressed a chaste kiss to Cipher’s mouth. Cipher’s response was immediate, soft and sweet. She placed her hands on the back of his neck, fingers tracing the twin scars there. One to put the brain-bomb in, one to take it out. Her own marks on his body, to match what his previous partners had left.

“What about Marielle?” Cipher asked when the kiss ended. She didn’t move her hands or step away.

“When the transition from Imperial Intelligence drew to a close, Marielle purchased me an antique blaster dating to the days of Exar Kun.” Keeper’s voice sounded rough to his own ears. “Fully operational. Absolutely exquisite. She asked that I end my own life honorably rather than drag House Miurani through the shame of my dismissal and execution. When I refused, she had her brother annul our marriage. Marielle is a master politician. She knew when I was gracefully retired that I’d blackmailed my way out of the consequences of my actions. Neither she nor my son have any interest in speaking to me.”

“I’m sorry.”

Keeper rested his forehead briefly against Thirteen’s. His lips twitched in a sad smile.

“No, you’re not. But it is kind of you to say.”

“I’m sorry it was my fault.”

“I wasn’t the man they believed me to be,” Keeper corrected her softly. “That isn’t your doing. I destroyed my family the moment I decided as a young corpsman that achieving the mission’s goals was more important than following orders. It just… took a while to take effect.” Keeper stepped away, and moved his hands from Cipher’s hips to frame her face. “Come. We have to meet our ride at the spaceport while Lord Beniko is still distracted by the Mandalorian camp.”

~*~

Keeper had no interest in leaving a witness behind for Shan to interrogate. The smuggler was a skilled fighter, but he was no match for two skilled Intelligence operatives. The Twi’lek’s corpse was dumped out of the airlock once they left the atmosphere.

Cipher was dead, but the Red Blade’s status was ambiguous. When she rolled into Nem’ro’s palace with a new ship, a cargo-hold full of spice, and a body-guard who moved like an assassin, no one thought twice.

“Like what you’ve done with the place,” the Red Blade said as she walked into Nem’ro’s audience chamber.

“So, Kaliyo parted ways from you as well,” Nem’ro said grandly. “Hopefully while leaving your purse intact.”

“She got a better offer,” Blade shrugged. “I can’t complain: Ryk here has more uses for me than she did.”

Keeper barely kept his shoulders from twitching in surprise. He personally thought he was a little old for such a ploy, but—apparently not. All right, then. Unusual tastes or not, Ryk wasn’t going to look a lovely red-headed gift Bantha in the mouth. So to speak.

“Things got a little warm on my last job,” Blade continued, “I need to trade some hard goods for a new identity so solid it could pass an Imperial background check. Figured you could cut me a deal.”

“For the one who rid me of Fathraa forever?” Nem’ro gestured to Fathraa’s head. It had been encased in Seal-tite and mounted on the wall. “Always.”

Nem’ro set them up with his slicer. Blade outlined what she needed for the new identity. Keeper had recommended she take the opportunity to reclaim her medical license. Blade specified a medical doctorate to the slicer so she’d have an avenue for quick cash if she needed it.

“A medical degree complicates things,” the Rodian clicked, “the job will take longer, cost more.”

“You let Nem’ro and I worry about credits,” Blade said, waving her hand. After the slicer had been sent on his way, they headed to the Cantina. Blade ordered them both a meal and a drink, then leaned back against the bar.

It was interesting she’d felt the need to make such a point about Ryk’s “talents.”

“You possessive, Boss?” Ryk asked when the scantily-clad waitress arrived with the alcohol they would only be pretending to drink. Cipher suppressed her Dromund Kaas accent as Blade, so Keeper followed suit as Ryk.

“Very,” Blade said simply, giving the waitress a firm look. “That going to be a problem?”

“Not at all.”

~*~

He wasn’t certain if Cipher pushed Keeper against the door of their cheap rented room or if Blade pushed Ryk.

It had been almost a year since he had been touched by another, no matter who he was. Either Cipher or Blade knew it. She wasn’t playing fair: kissing at the corner of his jaw where he was most sensitive, urging his body to passion with heated caresses.

This was a bad idea for so many reasons.

“Here? Now?” The half-hearted protest was Keeper’s, the voice was Ryk’s.

“You didn’t seem to have a problem with an audience on Dromund Kaas,” Cipher or Blade purred with a truly wicked grin.

The thinness of the walls was the least of their worries. He still couldn’t tell who was propositioning him or which of him was having a hard time thinking through it.

Cipher or Blade pressed against him, making small movements that promised so much more if Keeper or Ryk would only consent.

Ryk wouldn’t refuse Blade and Keeper’s record of resistance to Cipher’s advances was currently sitting at 0.

“You’re the boss.”

~*~

Keeper awoke unable to breathe. Cipher was straddling his hips, her hands locked around his throat. In the green half-light of the chronometer’s illumination, he could see her face was a snarl of hatred. He could not see the dim red glow of her cybernetics.

A bad idea for so many reasons.

Keeper slammed his hands down on her elbows to loosen Thirteen’s hold. He then shot a quick right hook at her cheekbone and rolled his hips left at the same time. Cipher slid off the bed. Her eyes flickered, booting up.

Keeper sat up, coughing involuntarily between raw gasps. He rubbed his neck. That was going to leave a mark.

Cipher began apologizing immediately. Keeper waved his hand.

“After the Republic tortured me, I slept in the guest room for three months,” he wheezed. He coughed again. “Happens.” He reached over and clicked on the bedside light. There was an angry bruise blossoming across the left side of Cipher’s face.

If Ryk entered the Cantina sporting bruises around his neck, people would assume the Blade liked it rough and was tough enough to make Ryk take it. If she went down wearing a bruise on her cheek, then Ryk beat her and the Blade was too weak to make him back off. It would make Cipher an instant target.

Unacceptable: in her current state, she wouldn’t be aiming to disable. They’d end up with a cantina full of dead patrons no longer able to pay their bar tabs -- and a very unhappy Hutt.

“I’m going to get a kolto pack for that, wait here.” Keeper pushed himself out of bed and pulled on his clothes.

Nem’ro’s palace and cantina didn’t have medbays, but the patrons of both lived rough enough lives that he did have several stalls selling stims and medpacks. The vendor smirked at him as he handed over the merchandise.

“Smirk like that again and I’ll cut you a Sith smile for the disrespect,” Ryk growled even though Keeper couldn’t care two credits what the little hood rat thought. The vendor paled, nodding.

Cipher had made herself a bed on the floor by the time he returned. Keeper didn’t argue. Between the two of him, she was less likely to wake the next morning moving like a crippled water crab.

He used enough of the medpack on Cipher’s cheek to eliminate the bruising. Then he handed it to her to doctor his neck. The kolto was cool on his skin and only stung a little as the flesh regenerated.

“There was only enough for the handprints,” Cipher said as she threw the wrapper in the waste bin. “Not this.” She caressed just beneath his ear with one finger. He didn’t have to look in a mirror to know she’d left a love-bite. He owed the stim vendor an apology.

“I wonder: is the Red Blade this territorial, or is Cipher?”

Cipher looked down at the floor, caught.

“Didn’t it ever seem weird to you that I insisted on tapping street kids for information myself, and none of them ever stuck around?”

“I rather assumed you wanted company your own age, but had difficulty forming friendships due to the extent of your experience,” Keeper admitted.

Cipher shook her head.

“You were my agent, they could go get their own.”

Oh.

“You never behaved out of turn with adult agents I worked with. You didn’t seem to mind Marielle once you got past the initial shock,” Keeper observed.

“You didn’t want an adult partner, they weren’t a threat,” Cipher said softly. “Neither was Marielle.”

That stung, that Cipher should know before he did how his marriage was playing out. On the other hand, she had considerable experience manipulating away threats to her position – and keeping him from noticing she was doing so. If it wasn’t for Cipher’s shaky mental state, he would have unquestioningly chalked all of this up to maintaining the Red Blade’s character.

“I’m retired.”  Keeper rested two fingers under her chin, urging her to look up. When Thirteen did, he flipped his hand to caress her jaw with the backs of his fingers. “If you want my fidelity, you need only ask.”

“I don’t want you to sleep with other women.” Cipher’s voice was still soft. She shrugged, smiling sadly. “At least until I go back to work. Please.”

“Done,” Keeper said.

~*~

The Red Blade told Nem’ro her current ship was hot and in need of a full wipe and registry change. She traded it with him for a small Corellian jump-ship. They took the jump-ship to Nar Shaddaa once the Rodian slicer had finished his work.

Norel Haddsan – one of Keeper’s old spacer covers – then sold the jump-ship on Nar Shaddaa in a deal paid with unmarked chits.

Afterwards, Ramul Sadow paid with unmarked chits for his return ticket to Mithaln-iruai, and another ticket for a newly-purchased slave.

Mithaln-iruai was a Chiss planet. Its Cheunh name translated to “Planet of Commerce.” It was the only world in the Chiss Acendancy where those without Chiss citizenship could live, and it served as a home base for all Imperial or independent businesses who operated inside Chiss borders.

Ramul was a force-blind born to a powerful Sith family. His service record was so heavily redacted that the only things it contained were his medical qualifications and a note that he had once held Chiss citizenship under House Miurani. The Chiss Acendancy was highly private, and did not tolerate questions into the affairs of it or its ruling houses.

For most arrivals, Chiss border control was very strict: a record taken of all biometrics, identification papers verified for authenticity, baggage scanned for contraband, and a full decontamination scan. Though the family disappointment twice over, Ramul had a long and trustworthy history with the Chiss as well as an established address on Mithaln-iruai. He and his new purchase were waved through with a simple “welcome home.”

Thirteen stayed a step behind Ramul as they crossed the spaceport. She kept her head tilted down submissively. People saw her and the baggage she was wheeling in the sense that they didn’t walk into her, but she was essentially furniture and they paid her as much attention.

Once the lift doors closed, Ramul removed the slave collar from Thirteen’s neck and tucked it into the top-most bag. Thirteen pulled off the ornate metal bracers Chiss slaves wore and put them in the bag as well. Without those two items, she was just a human woman in a black Chiss dress that marked her as servant-class.

Ramul pulled off his expensive suit jacket, folding it inside out and draping it over his arm to like a coat. He unbuttoned the top button of his shirt and rolled his sleeves up to mid-forearm. He picked up the top bag for himself. A minute change in posture and by the time the doors opened, Ramul and his slave were nowhere to be seen.


	20. Dr. Bessiker and Dr. Jennings

Keeper hired a speeder to a Mandalorian restaurant. After lunch they walked half a mile, then took another speeder to what was most assuredly not Ramul Sadow’s apartment.

The apartment complex was secure and well-maintained, with nice amenities. But it was simple, with unadorned walls and a library of medical data crystals. The pantry was stocked with healthy and relatively inexpensive food. There was a couch, holonet terminal. When Cipher opened the bedroom closet, it was obvious this was Keeper’s home, not a crash-pad. There were plenty of changes of clothes and—medical scrubs.

“You’re a doctor here?”

“Doctor Jennings is a general practitioner for a nearby hospital,” Keeper said, resting his hands on Cipher’s shoulders. “I had enough of doing nothing all day for a lifetime in Shadow Town. There are at least fifty species on Commerce Planet at any given time. It’s surprisingly challenging work.”

“If you’re living as Jennings, why is Ramul even here? The Dark Council knows his name.”

“Ramul has to register his domicile with the government as a condition of his release. Lord Arkous and his associates knew where I lived on Alderaan. If they dropped by and saw I didn’t live there anymore, they could bring whatever official resources they had to bear to find me without drawing any suspicion. Such as it is, investigating Ramul will reveal a fully-furnished apartment that is cleaned regularly, bank records showing local purchases, and his neighbors see him at random intervals once a month. He recently took a holiday on Nar Shaddaa. His bank records show significant sums gambled at various casinos.”

“You gave your credit chits to gamblers to cover rescuing Shara. But, if someone came for you in the middle of the night some night--”

“—Ramul would not be home. No one living even knows Doctor Jennings exists, much less to come looking for him. This is a Chiss planet. Imperial officials would have limited authority and opportunity to continue investigating once the legitimacy of Ramul’s residency had been established. The Chiss internal police do not share jurisdiction with anyone. If the Revanites cannot find me, Beniko and Shan most certainly cannot find you, ‘Sameen.’”

Sameen Bessiker was Fixer Thirteen, a medical operative missing and presumed dead on Tatooine. She wouldn’t be reclaiming her name or her designation. It was Cipher’s now.

The Kel Jennings cover had been an ex-agent, Cipher remembered. The best lies had a grain of truth to them. Not that it mattered. Keeper talked about what was most likely his real name like it was just another cover identity. Maybe, after pretending to be someone else for Marielle and their son for so long, it was.

She was suddenly so tired. Everything that had been keeping her going dried up, leaving something very close to despair in its wake.

“What is it?”

“Just tired,” Thirteen said slowly.

“Of course. Hop into bed. We can purchase you toiletries and clothes tomorrow, and see about an appointment with a mind-healer.”

It sounded like so much work.

She shed her dress and climbed under the covers as instructed. Keeper’s comforter was heavy; it had to weigh at least twenty pounds. She could see why he used it. The steady pressure was deeply relaxing, pushing her under more quickly than she’d ever achieved without orgasm.

~*~

She made it farther into the night before the nightmares woke her, but she still woke. Keeper gave her an antihistamine and put her back to bed.

By the time Thirteen woke up again, it was nearly 12:00. He’d left a note that his first shift back at the hospital was that day, and he would be home that evening.

~*~

Lord Beniko and Theron Shan opted for the head of Havoc Squad as Cipher’s replacement, which had sent Vector into a towering fury.

“You cannot leave,” Keeper told Vector bluntly. “I will inform the Wrath despite their choice. The Wrath will need a loyal Imperial on the inside if Lord Beniko’s motives are treasonous. If Lord Beniko is sincere, you must be there to protect the Empire if her Republic allies betray her.”

As anticipated, the Wrath had no interest in returning the Minister of Intelligence to Shadow Town.

“It’s a damn shame you’re a cripple,” the Wrath said bluntly. “You’ve forgotten more than either of your brothers will ever know. With the Dark Side as your ally, you could have brought glory to the Sadow name such as to make generations of your enemies’ offspring weep.”

“I have other allies, my lord, who serve me just as well.” He would not trade Shara, Fixer Twelve, Thirteen, or her team for the Force even if he could.

If despite all he had done for the Empire, his house and their allies still wished to regard him as the family shame—well, that was on them.

The Wrath snorted his disbelief in a most un-Sithlike fashion.

“I have heard rumors of this Order of Revan. Thank you for the hard intel. I will see to the situation immediately.” He disconnected the holocall.

~*~

Somehow, Keeper had managed to finagle an appointment with a mind-healer at the end of the week. Doctor Firka took an imaging scan of her brain and gave her a full medical workup.

“Sith’s blood,” he swore when he saw the results. “What in the Emperor’s name did you do?”

“It’s classified,” Cipher told him. “I did it twice. One of the side-effects is ocular nerve degeneration but obviously,” she gestured to her cybernetics, “not an issue.”

Firka gave her a hard look. Then he softened his bearing, putting on his bedside manner.

“I hope you were told beforehand: much of the damage is irreversible. There is nothing I or anyone else can do to make you the person you were before.”

Cipher nodded. She hadn’t been told beforehand, but Watcher X had told her during.

“I can, however, repair some of it. The next two months are not going to be easy: vertigo, nausea, intestinal upset, massive mood swings. If you decide to go forward with treatment, to be blunt, I would recommend setting up a sleeping kit in the bathroom and planning not to leave.”

Cipher took two deep breaths.

“What if I don’t go forward? Am I looking at nightmares and adrenaline jolts forever?”

“The nightmares and panic attacks are post-traumatic,” Firka said, shaking his head. “They aren’t related to the brain damage. Whether you treat the damage or not we can ameliorate the post-traumatic response through therapy and medication.”

He pulled out a stylus and circled the heaviest concentrations of spider-webbing on her scan.

“I don’t know what this is adhered to your corpus callosum and brain stem. Removal would be extremely dangerous and of limited effectiveness, even with nanoprobes. Since it isn’t interfering with your motor skills or homeostasis, I recommend we leave it alone. The rest of the damage, the fixable damage, is centered on the parts of the brain responsible for impulse control and conscience.”

The brain stem to intercept her motor functions; the corpus callosum for maximum penetration into her mind; impulse control to keep her from stopping herself; and conscience to inhibit the moral judgment that would motivate her against her directives.

“If they were trying to make you a super-soldier, I’m certain it was effective,” Firka continued.

That was what Watcher X had meant by the option to push her past her limits.

“You don’t have to make a decision right now,” Firka said kindly. “Just think about who you were before the procedure and the kind of choices she made. Compare her to the kind of choices you make now. If you’re returning to the field, maybe not feeling it when you kill and snap-judgments are what you need. It’s up to you. If you decide to keep what you are, I can teach you ways to stop yourself from devolving into a sociopath. If you do go through with treatment, I can help you cope with feeling your actions again.”

Cipher was quiet the rest of the day, and Keeper let her be.

Killing Ardun and Fathraa had seemed so practical. So had leaving Mia’s sister to die, killing Hunter, massacring the Star Cabal leadership and the Jedi in the Tython Temple. Even killing that Twi’lek smuggler a few days ago. Logical choices, quickly made though not enjoyed.

Would she have made the same choice before her brainwashing? Would the person she was now have let Karrels live? Axis?

The only kill both of her would have made was Watcher X, because he had threatened Keeper’s anonymity as an attempt at bribery.

She still spared people from time to time – Wheel, Saber, Pashton Cortess. She wasn’t yet a monster. Firka said he’d teach her to stay on the lee side of sociopathy. Cipher could keep who she was, treat the post-traumatic symptoms, and go back to work practically a super-soldier. If she rejoined Intelligence when it was remade, she would be their star killer. Maybe even Keeper, someday.

Nine had asked after her first mission on Hutta why she had joined. The Healer on Voss had asked the same question with different words. Now Doctor Firka had asked her to think about the person she’d been when deciding on her future.

“Nine?”

Keeper looked up from preparing dinner.

“Why did you ask agents their motives for joining Intelligence? It seems like such a trivial question.”

“Far from it,” he replied, dumping chopped vegetables into a pot. “Why an agent joined told me what kind of agent they’d be. Those who had joined with the goal of Moff couldn’t be trusted with unspeakable missions or team work: they would always be after the limelight. Nor could they be trusted around the Sith, because they would be more interested in currying favor than the integrity of the department. Those who wanted their ‘license to kill’ could only be used as assassins. Any missions requiring subtlety or diplomacy weren’t for them. Those who joined to serve and protect made the most versatile agents, provided they could learn to trade ideals out for goals. Those who couldn’t were defectors in the making – who also had their uses.”

Cipher remembered her answer: to serve and protect.

“Doctor Firka says the parts of my brain regulating conscience and impulse control were damaged. Before—Without the serum, was I a defector in the making?”

“Never,” Keeper said. “Originally, I wanted you for my successor. But after Alderaan it was clear that you and Vector were both born diplomats who could stomach the occasional murder for the cause. Those are exceedingly rare and precious, like Sith healers. It was only a matter of time before the Diplomatic Service made you an offer you could not refuse. Unfortunately, events turned out—quite differently than I anticipated.”

Hunter. Ardun Kothe. The Star Cabal. The woman who had brought Alderaan into the Empire was dead and buried. She could be made no offer.

“The first use of Serum IX isn’t damaging,” Keeper said gently. “You barely feel it. That was the point. It’s the dose that freed you that hurt you.”

She’d chosen her many-pointed star and the white light. She’d chosen to be a doctor, to take the diplomatic options when they presented themselves. Free, and of her own free will.

The second dose had only been chosen because Ardun Kothe had left her no choice. Because he had taken her Restraints and perverted them. Exploited them. Used them in a way they’d never been intended – and then not even kept the key to those chains to himself. If Shan knew, then the whole of the SIS knew and was complicit.

She hated Ardun Kothe. She would never stop hating Kothe, or Shan by extension.

Cipher would not wear his scars.

“I want to go through with the treatment.”

Nine smiled. Not just a deepening of lines around mouth and eyes, but a real smile that curved his lips upward and lit up his eyes.

~*~

Doctor Firka had been lying through his teeth when he’d described the treatment process as “not easy.” Eight different medications that had to be administered throughout the day – sometimes Thirteen was literally taking something every hour. She had a strictly regimented sleep schedule enforced by sedative, and a diet that could only consist of a soup-like nutrient blend which reeked of oily fish. The only thing Firka had been telling the truth about was Cipher living in the bathroom. Most of the time the vertigo was so bad she couldn’t crawl without colliding into the walls, much less walk.

Even for a younger man than he it would be exhausting to come home from a full day of work to a reeking apartment; a bathroom filled with the remnants of assorted biohazards Cipher was too ill to fully clean; a fresh hell of dirty laundry; making the next days’ worth of fish-blend as well as his own dinner; and then restocking the pill-case Cipher used to keep track of what to take when… only to collapse into bed and start over the next morning.

Firka had also glossed over the mood swings. Thirteen wept perhaps once every three years. Now it was a daily occurrence. The upside to the severity of her symptoms was that when the switch flipped _completely without warning_ to anger she couldn’t really do much by the way of damage to Keeper. Herself, now, that was another matter. Bloody noses from falling or lunging left instead of right were a frequent occurrence.

It was worse when she opted to use her words instead of her fists. Cipher’s skills as a diplomat and interrogator meant when she wanted to wind him up, she was fully capable. When Thirteen had been his asset, Nine had never once raised a hand to her in anger. Now he found himself closing the bathroom door and going for a walk (he did not have the energy for a run) to maintain his self-control.

Cipher was always contrite and cuddly when he returned. Usually that ended in her hiccup-gasp version of crying. Sometimes she just threw up on his chest.

Keeper couldn’t even just sedate her for a few hours’ peace. Her sleep schedule was intrinsic to her recovery and could not be tampered with.

Keeper reminded himself daily that the choice to administer the Restraints in the first place had been his, as had been the decision to keep Cipher on duty after she’d returned from Quesh. When that didn’t work, he reminded himself that as unpleasant as Thirteen’s recovery was, it was an improvement over Shadow Town.

His colleagues at the hospital noticed the changes in his demeanor. When his supervisor inquired, Keeper told a redacted version of the truth: his ex-partner from his Intelligence days had been wounded in the line of duty and was recovering with him. The injuries included brain damage. It wouldn’t interfere with his work at the hospital.

“That’s rough, Jennings,” his supervisor said, clapping Keeper on the shoulder despite his reputation for aloofness. “My wife was in a speeder accident years back. Coma for four days, damage to the frontal cortex. Those meds--” He whistled, low and long. “How long of a round is he scheduled for?”

“She. Two months,” Keeper said simply. “Three and a half weeks have elapsed.”

“Look, if you need to crash in the on-call bunkroom, help yourself. I’ll tell the ER sup, explain the situation. Keep up the good work.” Another clap on the shoulder, and his supervisor departed.

It was—not at all like working for the military or Intelligence.

~*~

On the fifty-eighth day of her treatment, Cipher greeted him sitting cross-legged on the kitchen floor. She held up a plate with a sandwich on it.

“Thank you,” Keeper said as he took the plate. “Why are you sitting on the floor?”

“When I tried sitting on the chair, I fell off. I can’t really stand up for long periods yet. But I’m out of the bathroom! And I made food.”

She was ridiculously pleased with herself, and in a good mood for the first time in nearly eight weeks.

At long last, progress.

~*~

All of what she’d been through was classified. She couldn’t even give broad sketches without details. Dr. Firka wasn’t concerned: he’d worked with military patients before. With time, patience, and practice she would be able to move forward, one weekly appointment at a time.

He also prescribed her a weighted blanket of her own for the couch so Keeper could have his back for the bed. His was black. She picked red.

~*~   

To: Vector, Eckard, Kaliyo, SCORPIO, and Raina:

ENCRYPTED MESSAGE, SCORPIO PROTOCOL 7

I can’t tell you where I am. I know you can’t tell me anything. I just wanted to let you know that I’m seeing a mind-healer. He has me on a strict diet and exercise regimen that’s helping with the nightmares, so I’m optimistic about getting better. I hope you are all alive and unhurt.

\--C

 

To: Vector:

ENCRYPTED MESSAGE, SCORPIO PROTOCOL 7

There was membrosia at the grocery store yesterday. I didn’t expect Oroboro to take me seriously, but I’m glad they did. I hope we get to meet again soon.

I noticed the business account is nearly empty, and you haven’t purchased any rations for a while. I’m the only one who likes it when the nest donates leftovers, so I’m attaching intel I had in my files on the locations/habits of some fat death-marks. If you can spare Kaliyo and SCORPIO, they should be able to knock them out. If you can’t spare them, write me back and I’ll come up with something else.

\--C

 

To: UNKNOWN RECIPIENT

ENCRYPTED MESSAGE, SCORPIO PROTOCOL 8

We are most pleased to hear from you, and that you are recovering. Our nest-away-from-the-nest, as it were, is colder in your absence.

We know contacting you is a great risk, but four days ago there was a large sum of credits transferred into the business account. SCORPIO traced the funds through several shell corporations before losing the trail completely. We must ask if the money is your doing.

If procuring it was anything that risks your cover or places you in danger, we ask that you not do so again. We can figure these things out ourselves, we give you our word.

\--Vector

 

To: Vector

ENCRYPTED MESSAGE, SCORPIO PROTOCOL 9

Wasn’t me: he cracked my password and read my mail.

You’ve got enough now to replace the forward deflector screens if you haven’t already.

\--C

~*~

“Now that the brain damage is as repaired as it is going to get and your nightmares have improved, we’re going to start working on the trauma itself. You can’t tell me what happened,” Dr. Firka explained, “so we’re going to take two approaches. One is to have you as physically relaxed as possible. Then I’m going to have you relive the traumatic events in your imagination while consciously keeping your body relaxed. We confuse physiological states for genuine emotion all the time – for example, deciding our partner was being unreasonable when we were in fact simply hungry – and by repetition this technique harnesses that.”

“Because your body feels relaxed while remembering, your brain decides it wasn’t that bad,” Cipher paraphrased.

“Exactly. Triggers are sensations or circumstances now that cause you to feel like you’re back in the traumatic event. I don’t have to know why the sensation or circumstance is a trigger, only that it is. By exposing you to that trigger in a safe environment, we can help you learn to stay in the now while it is happening.”

“That sounds like a bad idea,” Cipher said frankly.

“You are not my first military patient. We’ll be fine.”

“There’s just one. The word ‘keyword’ followed by--” she couldn’t say it “—the word for fearing a word.”

“All… right. Well. Switch off your eyes and lay down.” Firka switched on a white noise machine. It played the soft sound of rain on leaves. Cipher obeyed, tension knotted down her spine and a sick feeling in her stomach. Nothing was going to happen. Nothing was going to happen. “I want you to picture yourself in a forest. The rain is gentle and warm. You’re completely alone, and totally safe. Describe the forest for me.”

“Outside Kaas City,” Cipher said. “About five klicks south of the main Mandalorian hunting camp.”

“I’ve never been on Dromund Kaas,” Firka said. “What makes this spot so special?”

Cipher described the spot she’d camped for her survivalist training in the Academy: the moss-covered cave she’d sheltered in, not far from a creek that poured over a small weir in the rock face. Game had been plentiful and better tasting than the rats her gang had hunted as children when ill-gotten gains ran scarce. After Interrogation Resistance, it had been a welcome respite. The recording of rain helped her picture the spot. She felt a pang of sadness: she was dead, and could never return there.

“All right. Breathe in slowly, then out as I count. One. Two. Three. Again, you are completely safe. On the count of three. One. Two. Three. Keyword onoma--”

Cipher felt the crunch of bone under her fist before her eyes had finished booting or she even realized she’d left the couch.

“I’m sorry,” she babbled, pulling tissues out of the box to hand to Firka. Blood was gushing from his nose. “I’m so sorry, I said this was a bad idea, I’m so sorry.”

“Mfauld for sidding do clode,” Firka said, using the tissues to catch the blood.

“This is going to hurt,” Cipher warned, and popped his nose back into place.

She went with him to the hospital, and stayed till the nurse administered bone-knitting nanoprobes.

Firka insisted the next session they’d try again, but he’d station himself across the room. She wasn’t the first client to clock him.

~*~

On Keeper’s days off they ran together. His hospital had a paved trail that circled the edge of their property for the families of patients or medical staff to relax, or for physical therapy patients to run with their therapists. She could run for longer than he could, but the extra muscle mass he’d added in prison had her completely disadvantaged for short sprints.

“Someday,” she panted, touching the tree almost a full seven-count after he did, “I’m going to beat you.”

Keeper tossed her water. “An unrealistic goal will keep you humble.”

“Jennings!”

A Chiss man she’d never met ran out of the hospital. He was wearing a suit and dress pants, but he had doctors’ credentials around his neck. Keeper sobered when he saw him.

“ER supervisor, Doctor Kolanthus,” he explained, moving to intercept. Cipher followed.

“I know you’re a GP now,” Kolanthus said urgently, “but in Intelligence you were trauma, correct?”

“Certified,” Jennings answered.

“A demolition went poorly, damn Hutts. It fell into the building next door which fell on the building next to it. We’ve got over a hundred people inbound. Scrub up,” Kolanthus ordered.

“I was a medical operative as well,” Thirteen volunteered, “trauma was most of what I did. My license is still valid. Sameen Bessiker.”

“I’ll take it,” Kolanthus said. “Jennings, show her where.”

After they were clean and outfitted, Kolanthus gave them each a cart.

“Triage and declare,” he instructed. They could hear the sirens of the first wave of emergency vehicles. “You don’t have to know where anything is for that and it’s most like battlefield medicine. The droids’ll keep your cart stocked and pull the bodies. Nurses will transfer out the patients ready to move.”

“A body is a body, don’t be nervous,” Keeper said. She had no idea if he was talking to himself or her. There were butterflies in her stomach. Cipher had treated injured comrades, even dying ones. Never in a hospital. Hopefully Keeper was right.

Keeper could not be called by his designation in front of civilians. It was too dangerous. Jennings or Nine. She would have to remember to respond to Bessiker. 

The biggest difference was volume. As soon as she cleared one patient and changed gloves there was another. Change. Another. Stabilize and OR. Stabilize and ICU. Unsaveable. Not critical, move back outside to wait. Already dead before she could get there.

She moved left to right along her row of stations and then back to the beginning. An endless circuit of blood and tears.

“Thirteen!” Nine’s voice barked. He wouldn’t summon help if he didn’t need it. His patient was a Twi’lek woman with a distended belly. She was caked with building dust. There was a large gash in her head. She wasn’t breathing. “The mother is dead, the child is not.”

“We don’t have time to operate.” More injured were stacking up in the hallway. She grabbed separators anyway. With the mother not breathing, the child’s clock was counting down.

“We don’t have time not to,” Nine said. “I need you to pull the flesh aside and get the baby breathing on its own while I finish cutting it loose.”

She’d covered emergency c-sections in medical school, but it wasn’t her discipline. Hopefully Nine remembered more than she did, or had studied up in prison. He made a short, deep cut. Dead meant no bleeding to obscure vision. Thirteen slid her hands inside, feeling for the head—

“Here.”

Nine made another, shallower cut. Then he went back to slicing the skin and fascia.

Thirteen slid the separators behind her left arm, widening the aperture. She supported the baby’s neck with her left hand. With her right, she grabbed a suction bulb and pulled as much of the neonatal fluid as she could. There was so little room to work. She set the bulb down, then slid her hand between the child’s chest and the uterine wall. She massaged, trying to mimic contractions as best she could—The child’s chest jerked a little. Then again. Thirteen pulled her hand out, aspirated away more fluid, then massaged again.

Two more jerky cough-breaths and it made a tremulous wail.

Nine began cutting away the uterine wall, careful not to nick Thirteen’s hands or the baby. She lifted the child free. Nine clamped and cut the umbilical. The newborn was alive. He was going to make it. She wrapped him in a sterile towel and passed him off to the nurse. The droid began wheeling the corpse away.

Thirteen touched Keeper’s elbow as he pulled off his gloves.

“Excellent work, Nine.”

Nine nodded. He couldn’t speak. For one such as they, used to only the darkest deeds, to be able to do something so purely light--

Thirteen smiled and changed her gloves. The next patient was waiting.

Critical injuries began giving way to broken bones and lacerations. Then to injured first responders who had worked through the pain.

Kolanthus administered a stim apiece at the four-hour mark instead of a meal.

It was well past 01:00 by the time they cleared the rush enough to be released.

“You’re Jennings’s discharged partner, aren’t you?” Kolanthus said at the door to the women’s shower. Thirteen nodded. “How long are you going to be on Commerce Planet?”

“At least four more months,” Thirteen said honestly. “Maybe longer. Maybe a lot longer.” She still couldn’t get through a session with her trigger nor a session reliving the event in her imagination. Dr. Firka didn’t want her returning to the field until she could remain calm for the entirety of both exercises.

“I will be very blunt: this planet is important strategically and economically, but socially it’s the middle of nowhere,” Kolanthus stated. “It is not a top priority for young medical graduates focused on making a name for themselves, nor mid-career practitioners trying to make supervisor. I have been short an ER doctor for six months. That was solid work you did in there. I think we could help each other, even if only temporarily.”

“Are you offering me a job?”

“Are you accepting one?” Kolanthus countered.

“Yes.” She was starting to feel restless doing nothing all day. Steady work would also provide a longer-term solution to the team’s money problems.

“Come in tomorrow night to do the paperwork. We still have to do the background check to make it official, but so long as your service record is clean that won’t be a problem.”

~*~

The night she was officially hired, Nine asked her to sleep in his bed instead of the couch. He’d snagged a kolto pack in case he had to punch her off him.

It wasn’t necessary. No strangulation, no nightmares. Firka’s therapy was working.

She hadn’t felt up for much of anything since Hutta, and nonstop sickness plus mood swings wasn’t exactly a turn-on for a partner.

Clean, warm, safe, and fully rested in her partner’s bed, with his morning erection digging into her thigh— Well, it had only seemed prudent to kiss him awake and take full advantage.


	21. Endgame

Ramul Sadow’s credits could not pay for anything related to Kel Jennings. With Thirteen working, she and Nine worked out a budget for shared expenses. Nine fronted the lion’s share. Most of Thirteen’s was given to a money launderer to deposit in the team’s business account.

Nine was happy to help the team by freeing up Thirteen’s funds for donation, of course.

He would admit only to Dr. Firka that he very much liked the feeling of control and being needed by Thirteen being the primary provider gave him.

They also made a schedule for house chores… with the rule that Nine was not allowed to redo, complain about, or suggest a more efficient method for any chore that fell under Thirteen’s area of responsibility. Failure to obey meant Thirteen did not have to cook any of her nights for the entire week the infraction occurred.

“It’s really worth it to you to open your mouth? All you’d have to do is—zzzt, and you could have a night off from cooking,” Thirteen said after the third straight week of not cooking at all because Nine couldn’t make it through Primeday.

“I will feed you that fish nutrient broth,” Nine threatened.

“Don’t make empty threats, Nine.” Thirteen took a sip of her membrosia. “You hate how it makes the apartment smell.”

~*~

Being an ER doctor was harder work than she’d pictured. Sometimes it was adrenaline and danger, with speeder accidents and patients on the brink of death from stroke or massive internal infections they’d let go just an hour too long. Sometimes it was boredom, waiting all day with nothing but the occasional broken bone.

Other times it was plain funny, hearing the stories that went with her patient’s bizarre injuries. How exactly did your son get a speeder antenna hooked on his nasal septum, ma’am?

It was also so very connected to life itself. Explaining to a young Rattataki patient and her new Cathar husband about the need to wrap his penis spines before sex. Or explaining to a family their loved one could only survive on a machine, and they needed to decide whether to pull the plug.

The first time Keeper received a letter from a patient thanking him for saving their life, he’d cried. When Cipher got hers, she understood why.

It wasn’t what you trained for as a killer, or if you specialized in battlefield medicine in med school.

But it was good.

~*~

She imagined Kothe telling her to sit down in his office, then commanding her to jump. Telling her to aim her rifle. Being unable to pull the trigger.

Firka’s white noise machine was playing the sound of rain mixed with a Korriban flute.

“I couldn’t stay relaxed,” Cipher told him after she’d played out the entire scene in her mind. Her shoulders and neck ached from holding the tension. “But I didn’t want to throw up this time.”

Firka smiled.

~*~

Nine’s schedule was rigid: five days of 09:00 to 18:00 and one day a month in the urgent care. Thirteen’s schedule varied wildly from one week to the next. Dr. Firka was insistent that Nine and Thirteen make a point to speak in person about something other than work once a day. They did their best to follow his instructions.

It helped that they shared a staffroom. They could snatch a quick hello at the caffa pot, or try to finagle taking their lunches at the same time. On Thirteen’s 24-hour days, Nine made a habit of stopping by the bunkroom to say goodbye when her sleep-break coincided with the end of his shift.

By Intelligence standards, it was indiscreet to the point of blatantly obvious. But since there was no policy forbidding doctors in different departments from fraternizing, neither of them saw any point to keeping secrets.

~*~

Working for a civilian company was nothing like working for a military or para-military institution. Chains of command were murkier, gossip was freer, and there was a heavy social component. Birthing-day parties, going-away parties, promotion parties: all were mandatory attendance. Workplace friendships were also expected. Not that their coworkers were bad or unpleasant people. It was just that as far as anyone at the hospital knew, Kel Jennings had been a Fixer in Research and Development. Classified work, risky in the same way working with a Class Five virus was risky, but not dangerous. Jennings had never been Cipher Nine, nor Keeper. Neither had his partner, Sameen.

No one at the hospital knew that between the two of them, they could massacre everyone at the hospital in eight hours and sleep like a kitten that night. They knew Sameen was on extended medical leave following an injury sustained in the line of duty. They did not know those injuries were brainwashing and torture.

There was no way for Keeper or Cipher to form genuine friendships with anyone at the hospital. Everything that made them who they were was classified. Even if it wasn’t, civilians could never understand the life.

Being ex-Ciphers, they wore masks. Sameen was a quiet young woman who favored playing audience to a boisterous group of women who enjoyed her attention. Kel Jennings was a seasoned runner who favored athletic companions unlikely to notice he didn’t talk much about himself. The downside was listening to more talk about Huttball than he preferred, but it was better than having to keep an elaborate cover story straight.

From when he’d first arrived on Mithaln-iruai until he’d brought Thirteen home had been a different form of solitary confinement. More quantity of contact than Shadow Town, but no more quality.

He dreaded Thirteen’s recovery. Not that he wished her the nightmares or the anxiety, but—Having her so close at hand so often was… something that he would miss. Not that she would be leaving completely. There would be breaks, pauses in combat where she could and would be able to visit.

It just wouldn’t be the same as living with him.

Not that he would ever ask her to stay. Cipher was the best, even more so after the Serum IX had augmented her abilities as a fighter. He could not begrudge the Empire its most skilled defender. His time with Thirteen thus far was more happiness than he deserved.

But part of him also hoped she would not want to return to war. Time with Thirteen was like drinking salt water: the more he drank, the thirstier he was. There was also the fact that a psyche broken once was easier to break again. Cipher could return to the field and come back even more unhinged than she’d been before. Perhaps even irreparably so.

Not, Keeper reminded himself often, that it was his decision to make. Dr. Firka was far more qualified than he to declare Cipher fit or unfit for duty.

~*~

“Keyword: onomatophobia,” Dr. Firka said. The rain was playing. She was in her forest glen.

Her fingers twitched, but there was no rage. No fear. Nothing happened.

“Well, I dare say that is progress,” Firka said happily.

Thirteen was bittersweet. Her vacation was nearly over. All she had to do was make it through visualization and she’d be cleared.

“Does that mean I can return to fieldwork soon?”

Dr. Firka titled his head.

“How does that prospect make you feel?”

“Nervous,” Thirteen answered. “It’s been a while, my skills are probably rusty even if my physical conditioning isn’t. And—I thought I’d be happy, but—I’m not. Is that… bad? A sign the brain damage has changed me forever?”

“Everything changes us forever,” Firka said, picking up a large glass gem from the table and holding it out to her. “It’s the nature of linear time. Flip the gem over so its flat side is on your palm. Cover one of the facets with your finger. Is it not a gem now?”

“That’s a stupid question.”

“Then let me ask it a different way. Which facet comprises the whole of the gem?”

“It’s a table-cut. Multi-faceting is the point.”

“Each of those facets is like a cover identity, a designation, even your real name. No matter how small a part of you, they are all a part,” Firka explained. “But none of them can ever be said to be the whole. Removing one does not make the whole ‘not a gem’ anymore. Now flip the gem over, table-side up. Now that the table is visible, is the gem changed? Does it sparkle less?”

“No,” Cipher whispered.

“You have kept the part of you that is a healer buried under the pointy-side of you that kills people. It’s what you needed to do. There’s nothing wrong with it, or choosing to go back to it. But ‘the war,’ such as it is, has carried on without you. If you want to exist flat-side up for a while, there is nothing wrong with that, either.”

~*~

To: UNKNOWN RECIPIENT

ENCRYPTED MESSAGE, SCORPIO PROTOCOL 12

It is done. Revan is defeated, the danger has passed. We wish to see you as soon as possible, so we may sing you the song of our journey, and hear yours.

-Vector

~*~

Thirteen met her team on her day off at the apartment she shared with Nine. Raina and Vector hugged her. Cipher even hugged Kaliyo, despite the latter holding her arms to the side and grousing that this wasn’t what she did.

“Tell me everything,” Cipher said after she’d set them all up with tea, water, or membrosia. Kaliyo was most disappointed to find she and Nine did not keep alcohol in the house, since neither of them drank.

The story tumbled out of four mouths, interrupting and talking over each other in a joyous cacophony. Lord Beniko’s motives had been sincere. The head of the Order of Revan had been the real Revan. Using both the white and dark sides of the Force so powerfully had split Revan in two: one side a male white-sided Jedi ghost pale and ready to die; the other a female Sith who was the personification of the Dark Side’s near-madness. Both sides had been reunified, the unknown force feeding on the situation dispelled, and Revan granted a peaceful death. The head of Havoc squad had even refrained from betraying them.

Nine arrived home shortly before they finished recapping their adventures. Cipher ceded her chair to appropriate half of Raina’s couch cushion. Nine listened to the rest with interest.

“Revan predicted there was a threat coming. The Empire and the Republic must stand together against it or else fall separately,” Vector finished. “It does go against the grain, but if you could have seen Revan’s auras shine— It was like looking into the very heart of the Force itself. We cannot discount Revan’s prophecy easily. We never thought we would be open to the possibility.”

“You are the consummate diplomat,” Cipher said with a smile. “No one would be better qualified to lead negotiations.”

“At least we won’t get busted for treason,” Kaliyo said, leaning back on the couch. “Beniko got herself appointed head of the new Intelligence under Darth Marr. She tapped Lokin for head of R&D, Raina for an agent, me as an irregular. She wants you back, too.”

Cipher’s stomach clenched.

Nine was regarding her steadily. There was neither joy nor approbation in his face. It was her decision.

Her team was expectant.

She should feel happy. She should go back to work. She was as healed as she was ever going to be.

When Thirteen pictured going back— sex without desire after so long of nothing but enthusiastic consent, the lies, the moral dilemmas, and the killing—Dark deeds, even with white motives.

Her many-pointed star had never burned so bright as it did at the hospital. Dr. Firka and the Voss healer had said to go back to the root. Her root was a doctor, even if she’d lost sight of that in all the bloodshed.

Revan had been defeated without her just fine.

Cipher took a deep breath.

“I’m not coming back. I’m an ER doctor here. It’s good work. I like it. I want to keep doing it.”

“So, you’re bitching out,” Kaliyo said harshly.

“I guess I am,” Thirteen said, lifting her chin.

Kaliyo spat on the carpet.

“Please do not expectorate in my home,” Keeper said mildly.

“Go to Hell,” Kaliyo snarled. “This is your fault.”

“I don’t deny it. Cipher knew the risks of being in my employ.”

“Don’t bullshit me. She’s still in your ‘employ.’ You both live here but this couch isn’t being slept on. I should just kill you.”

“Don’t even think about it,” Cipher snarled, even as Nine said with glinting eyes, “you are welcome to try.”

“Minister,” Lokin asked gravely, “is this true?”

“Yes,” Cipher said at the same time Keeper said, “no.”

“Yes to the couch, no to the prostitution,” Cipher clarified. Keeper tilted his head in assent. His eyes dared anyone to say a word.

“Word games. A kept woman is still a whore,” Kaliyo spat. “Leaving us to play mistress is pathetic.”

“I’m not ‘playing mistress.’ This is my home. I’d pay more of the bills but most of my paycheck is spent on the Phantom. I’m switching careers to medicine. I’m happy. That’s it. Isn’t that enough?”

“We were not sure when to tell everyone, but now seems—prudent. We are leaving as well,” Vector said softly. “We are wanted by the Colony as Dawn Herald to all of the nests.”

Cipher smiled, feeling honest joy.

“Vector, that’s amazing, I’m so happy for you.”

“So—That’s it, then.” Raina choked. “This is goodbye. We’re breaking up the team.”

“You keep the ship, Raina,” Kaliyo snarled. “It’s got Cipher’s stink all over it.” She walked out of the apartment. Cipher looked down at the floor. Her chest ached.

“Nothing lasts forever,” Lokin said softly. “Good or bad. We should have a party. What is there for takeout here?”

~*~

The team left shortly before 24:00. Lokin was the last to leave. He paused at the doorway with Nine, watching as Cipher and Vector said their goodbyes on the pedestrian walkway outside the building. 

“I never had children,” Lokin said gently. “I will not say I care for Cipher as a daughter. I certainly take pride in her as much. For those of us in our line of work, that is enough. You will always have my respect, but I have to know--”

“You would not ask if our bodies were of an age,” Keeper said evenly. “That’s sloppy thinking.”

“It is,” Lokin agreed, smiling. “But I am asking anyway. Do you love her, and will you stay when her beauty fades?”

“I do. I will, if we live so long.” Revan’s prophecy, and the dark mass Vector said had escaped Revan’s death. There were no happy endings for agents, there never would be. Keeper knew that. So did Cipher, even if she chose to forget from time to time.

“Indeed.” Lokin smiled sadly. “If.”

~*~

It started as a particularly fast-spreading but mild infection: headache, fever, chills, coughing and sneezing. At first the assumption was it was a new strain of flu.

Then people began coughing up blood. A week later they started dying. Quarantines and containment protocols were activated, but by then it was too late. All the medical personnel on Mithaln-iruai had been exposed. As had the spaceport personnel.

One month after the first patient had started coughing on Methaln-iruai, it had spread from Wild Space to Nar Shaddaa. From Nar Shaddaa, it was everywhere. 100% contagious, 30% mortality, 20 day asymptomatic incubation period.

~*~

Nine gasped air as the latest coughing fit faded. His lungs felt heavy and his body ached. He leaned back against the wall with his eyes closed. The sounds of weeping vied with the sounds of coughing. The entire hospital had become a hospice.

They had assumed Revan’s prophecy was about an army, not a plague.

“Something’s bothering me,” Thirteen said, dropping next to him on the bench. She was pale, her cheeks flushed and eyes bright with fever. “I know it’s bothering you.”

“The virus,” Nine wheezed. “It’s too perfect. Too uniform across species. And it doesn’t affect the Purebloods.”

“We should try the Codex,” Cipher said, curling her fingers between Nine’s. “The Cabal was old. Maybe they faced it before.”

Nine nodded. Circumventing quarantine to leave the city wasn’t something doctors did. It wasn’t a problem for a pair of Ciphers, even ill ones.

~*~

When they removed the Codex from its hiding place and searched its files, they found exactly what they were looking for: the disease was called the Red Death. It had been engineered before the original Sith Empire had retreated into seclusion. The original Sith whose genes the purebloods carried had used it to cull rebellious slave populations. Someone – someone who had knowledge no living mortal could possibly possess – had dug it up.

Cipher sent everything to Lord Beniko.

“Someone is softening us up for invasion,” Beniko growled. “Consider yourself recalled to active duty, Cipher Nine.”

Thirteen was doubled over by a coughing fit so severe it left her unable to speak for several minutes. There was blood spatter on her hand.

She held her hand up to the holocamera.

“I can’t. I’m a doctor here. I’ve already been exposed. By the time whoever it is shows up, the Minister and I will both be dead.”

~*~

They returned to the hospital because there was nowhere else to go, nothing else to do that could do any possible good.

Ramul sent goodbyes that would never be read to his family. Thirteen sent hers to her team. Raina had already fallen to the Red Death. Lokin was specialized for virology, so desperate to find a cure that he cared more about the Codex files than Thirteen’s farewell.

Thirteen understood. If she had any of the skills required to help, she’d be just as desperate.

They tended to the dying for two more days before Doctor Kolanthus sat them down.

“The Red Death has entered its final stages. We can make it quick, or we can let nature take its course. It’s up to you.”

Cipher looked at Nine. His prison muscle mass was gone. His face was wan and haggard, his skin paper-like and dry. She wasn’t any better. Every breath was a battle, every night a war against pain. She felt like she’d never be warm again.

“Quick and painless is better than we ever hoped for,” she rasped, holding out her hand.

Keeper took it.

“Quick and painless.”

Kolanthus loaded the syringe well past what the safeties would permit. As soon as he depressed the plunger, Thirteen felt ice flow through her veins. She was floating, even swimming. For the first time, her gasp had nothing to do with not being able to breathe.

She was dying. They both were. The countdown of life in Imperial service was over: time was up.

Keeper had laid back on his hospital bed. His blue eyes were blown wide with the drug.

Cipher slid from her bed. Her knees buckled instantly.

Kolanthus knew what she wanted, and helped her lay against Nine.

“Five hundred and eighteen days,” Keeper murmured. He wrapped both arms around her, squeezing as tightly as the overdose would permit. “More than I ever deserved or hoped for.”

“You counted?” Thirteen hiccup-gasped.

“Every day,” Keeper said thickly. His eyes were wet.

“I’d have died on the streets a long time ago,” Cipher said. Her diction was slowed, even slurred. “If you hadn’t taken me as an asset. It was a long life, a good life. I wouldn’t trade it—not for anything--”

Whoever had sent this virus would come. They would have to be fought, the Empire defended. It was someone else’s fight. Theirs was over. At least they were going out doctors, instead of killers.

Her many-pointed star was beckoning. It was so bright she couldn’t see anything else. Everything was so heavy, and she was falling. A long endless slide with her partner beside her, her stomach swooping—

~*~


End file.
